


I Never...

by helens78, valuna



Category: Actor RPF
Genre: Consensual Kink, Consensual Violence, Dom/sub, M/M, Rough Sex, Rough Trade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-28
Updated: 2005-02-17
Packaged: 2017-11-19 23:13:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/578670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helens78/pseuds/helens78, https://archiveofourown.org/users/valuna/pseuds/valuna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sean Bean and Jonny Lee Miller are both guys who play everything as rough as it gets.  Neither one of them expected to live happily ever after, but here they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Never Seen You Here Before

**Author's Note:**

> This was cowritten with [Luna](http://ao3.org/users/valuna), who passed away in March 2010. She is greatly missed.

Another few nights like this and Sean's going to make some very messy explosions all over his house, or his office, or something. He's needed to blow off steam for a while, needed to get out and just find someone, anyone, a body to fuck, hips to bruise, lips to feel splitting open and bleeding under his, but he's been holding himself back from it, thinking all this was going to get better. That the need would die off. That the hurt would die down.  
  
Only it hasn't. It's been day after day and night after night for almost a week, and the censors on his behavior are worn through. He's got a bar he goes to for nights like this. He pulls into the gravel parking lot, steps out of his Jag, slams the door shut, and heads in the back door, skipping the bar altogether and wandering into the pool room. He looks perfectly ordinary. No excess of leather. A brown jacket. Jeans. Heavy boots, but they're mostly obscured by the cuffs of his jeans. Grey t-shirt. And a look on his face that says _I need something._ A look that doesn't leave anyone questioning whether he needs to give it or take it. Tonight he's here to give. As hard as he can. As much as he can. And soon, if he can find someone willing to take him.  
  
Jonny's shooting pool, unwinding after another long night behind the bar at an upscale, trendy club uptown. He likes this place better. It's friendly, ordinary, and no one gives a damn that he likes being taken out back, pounded into the gravel near the dumpster. He's leaning over the table, lining up the shot, white t-shirt riding up his back as he stretches, threadbare denim barely covering his ass, not that he minds giving anyone the view, and his feet never leave the floor, red hi-tops snugged under the jeans' frayed cuffs.  
  
Sean's eyes take in body after body, one after another, but they keep going back to the man on the table in the corner. There's something about the way that one's moving that he likes -- something about his movements that make Sean think he'd look amazing on hands and knees out back.  
  
He heads to the table, leans forward against the wood as the other man lines up his next shot. "Hey," he murmurs. And then the obvious opening: "Buy you a pint?"  
  
"Not very original," Jonny quips, chalking his stick as he glances up for the face that came with the voice. It's a nice face, and he thinks it probably looks even better from the ground. "But I suppose it'll work. Let me finish the game? Got a hundred ridin' on it."  
  
Sean gives a look -- a fast look -- to the man his mark for the evening's been playing with, and nods, fading into the shadows. "Didn't mean to interrupt," he says. _Be honest, Bean. You didn't give a damn._  
  
Jonny bites back the laugh. He knows it's as much of a lie as the stranger does. He shakes his head and lines up his shot, calls it and easily drops the last striped ball. Moving around the table, he glances over at the shadows, his mind more on the twitch in his jeans than calling the 8-ball. _C'mon, Miller, you can get laid later._ He stretches out, takes the shot and pockets it.  
  
"Awright, that does it," Jonny says, holding out his hand to his fellow player. "C'mon, Luke, pay up."  
  
Sean wonders a few things idly while the man with the cue gets matters settled. He wonders if there's something more to him and "Luke" than the game. Wonders if he's seen this man around and he's simply never noticed him before. Wonders if he should have come along a little earlier, whether he should have let himself come back here a few weeks ago when the need was a small dull ache in the pit of his stomach instead of something jagged and explosive and ugly. But none of that has to matter right now. Right now he's got other things on his mind, and he owes a stranger a pint.  
  
"Okay, you said something about a beer," Jonny says, turning from Luke -- friend, little more except when it's absolutely necessary --stuffing the money into his front pocket, snagging his beat-up leather jacket from the chair at table's end. "Wanna grab a table? Or spot at the bar?"  
  
 _Don't want either. I'd rather be outside._ "Table," Sean says, nodding out through the door to the other room. "Tell me what you want, and I'll get it and meet you wherever you're sitting."  
  
"Whatever's on tap's fine. Not picky." Jonny slips the jacket on, shrugging into the distressed leather and heads through the door, choosing a table at the far corner. _Fewer people to notice the groping._ He settles onto a chair and watches Sean make for the bar, admiring the curve of ass into thighs as he leans over, grabs the bartender's attention. _Might actually get what you want tonight. Looks like he could rip you apart._  
  
It doesn't take long to get the beer and head back to the table. Sean sits down across from Jonny and slides his glass across the table. "Good game," he says. "I'm Sean. Been enjoying watching you."  
  
"Jonny," he says, taking the beer in hand and sipping off a good inch of it. "Thanks. Luke's a shitty player. Always loses to me. Should know by now, but some guys just don't learn."  
  
"Some don't want to," Sean points out quietly. "Do you only come here for the pool, then, or are there other offers I can make?"  
  
"I come for the pool, to hustle a bit of spending money," Jonny says, eyes looking down at the table for a moment, then up at Sean's face, "sometimes to see if there's anyone willing to hurt me. What are you offering?"  
  
"I come here when the moods are dark enough to scare me," Sean says, laying his cards out flat on the table. "I come here looking for someone who wants to be torn into as much as I'm looking to tear someone apart. Sometimes I find it, sometimes not."  
  
Jonny keeps drinking while Sean's talking, downing half the pint before he's done. "You're in luck, then, 'cause I'd love to be torn apart. Take everything you got into that dark mood you wanna throw at me."  
  
Sean's barely touched his pint. It's mainly there because that's what's expected. You don't just walk in, order someone a drink, wait for them to finish while tapping your fingers and thinking with your cock. _Maybe you do._ Sean breathes out, nods. "You want to go somewhere for it, or will the lot outside do?"  
  
 _Pick me up off the floor in a few minutes._ Jonny can't believe his luck. Just came in to shoot some pool and now he's getting propositioned for exactly what he wants most. "Out back's great." _Seen more than my share of that gravel lot._ "You want to walk out together or should I hold back a few minutes?"  
  
"Give me a moment or two before you come out." Long enough to light a cigarette and try to calm his nerves down. Just a fraction. He takes another last drink of his beer and pushes up from the table. _Jonny._ He wonders why they bothered exchanging names; he has a feeling he's going to be growling _boy_ into the back of this one's neck in a few minutes.  
  
"Sure thing." Jonny settles back into his chair, works on finishing off his beer. He wonders what the fuck he's getting into. This one isn't some kid who'll do what he wants. _Definitely no having a say_ , he thinks, standing after a minute and heading toward the back of the bar, making a quick stop to piss. _No, you're gonna get fuck. Hard and fast and it's gonna hurt like hell._ His reflection's smirking at him as he washes his hands. _Oh, yeah. Let's go._  
  
Sean's got his cigarette glowing in the dark, one hand tucked into a pocket where his fingertips can graze over the condom he'll be using in a few minutes. He's got lube, too, but he's not expecting to need it. Wonders if Jonny's been around long enough to come to these places prepped, or if he'd rather just get hurt and hurt badly.  
  
He's only about a third of the way through his cigarette when Jonny walks out the back door, and he tucks it into his lips as he grabs Jonny by the arm and yanks him the few steps needed to be around the corner, pressed up against the side of the building. "Took you long enough," he murmurs. "How much d'you want to fight for it?"  
  
"Took a piss. That alright?" Jonny doesn't care about the answer. He's too focused on the hand on his arm, the one already bruising with just the first grip, the fight to come. He jerks his arm, pulling free, and he's sure that's by Sean's choice since his new playmate has the solid weight advantage. "Not like you could start without me." He hopes that, and the move he makes sideways, answers the question about putting up a fight. He wants to get hurt, but he's not just giving in.  
  
"No," Sean admits, taking a longer drag off his cigarette and then pulling it away from his lips. He gets both arms braced against the wall, trapping Jonny between them, and leans in, pressing his lips hard against Jonny's and passing him a breath of smoke.  
  
Jonny opens his mouth, as much because he _has_ to as wants. Sean's kiss is more than forceful; it threatens to push Jonny into the wall, meld him with it. And the smoke, well they say second-hand smoke's bad for folks, but Jonny's figuring a whole lot worse can happen tonight. He slips his hands up between their bodies, pushing on Sean's chest. Vain attempt to move the braced body. Half-hearted, perhaps, but he shoves, wanting to break the kiss long enough to get air.  
  
Sean lets him have it, pulls back and drops his cigarette, sliding both hands up Jonny's shoulders, to his neck, cupping his face, almost like he's memorizing features with touch. Maybe he is. "Mine tonight," Sean whispers. He rubs a thumb over Jonny's lips, grinds forward all over again, cock pressing against cock, a slow rough grind that pins Jonny to the wall. "Open your mouth for me."  
  
There's no denying the order. Clearly given. Jonny slowly opens his mouth, eyes meeting Sean's, back pressed into the wall, hands trapped between them, fingers rubbing and not meaning to, cock throbbing through too many layers of denim and spiraling him out. He opens a bit wider, his tongue brushing out against Sean's thumb.  
  
Thumb first; Sean slides it between Jonny's lips, letting himself feel tongue and lips and teeth and warmth on his skin.  
  
Jonny slides his tongue under the thumb, curls it up around from the sides, then pulls back and works it over top and around, taking his time. He slowly closes his mouth, sucking a bit harder, then biting, sharp and quickly before opening his mouth again.  
  
"Think we both know that's not where I really want your mouth," Sean murmurs. "Like the teeth, though. Making me think about how it'll feel when I'm choking off your breath and feeling your throat wrapped around my cock." He slips a hand between them, presses the heel of it hard between Jonny's legs. "Christ, you're hot for it." There's a rush that runs up his spine from the thought of that. _Wasn't joking. Doesn't think he's in over his head yet. Christ, this could be good._  
  
Pushing up hard into the touch, Jonny grins. "Hot for it? Yeah. Want it." Smile slips to smirk. "Not bad enough to beg. Yet. And if you want my mouth on your cock, you're gonna be knocking me to the ground first. I don't go that willingly, no matter how _hot_ I think it is." It's a game to Jonny. Give. Take. Give. Get slammed down. All for the getting hurt.  
  
"Your choice," Sean growls, and takes a step back, giving Jonny's cock a rough squeeze before hauling off and backhanding him, hard, across the face.  
  
The backhanded blow catches Jonny offguard, for a second, taking him off his feet against the building, balance disrupted long enough to stumble, nearly drop to the ground. But he pops his hand against the wall and braces his fall, shards of brick and mortar cutting into his palm. "Fuck," he says, pulling his hand up and licking clean the ooze and dust. "Yeah, my choice. I'm thinking you want to slam me down for it anyway."  
  
 _Fuck._ The sight of Jonny's tongue licking at his scratches has Sean's cock aching to be buried in him, and he grabs Jonny's wrist, yanks it forward, drags his tongue across the heel of his hand and tasting blood and grit.  
  
"Oh, shit," _we're playing for real_ , Jonny watches Sean lick at the blood. "You want, I can bleed better than that." He's smirking, knowing exactly what kind of trouble it's going to get him in, quickly making a mental note, _yeah, got the hospital insurance card with me_ , and visualizing just how badly he might be fucked up come morning.  
  
"Bet you can," Sean says, wrenching Jonny's wrist down, out of the way, spinning him around and shoving him hard against bricks. He presses up behind him, length of his body all the way from thighs to shoulders, pinning him in with both hands.  
  
Face hits the brick this time, cheek scratched on impact, and then the rest of Jonny's body, slammed tightly, cock wedged in a damned uncomfortable position, denim a bare covering. He breathes out, lets himself refocus, struggle for a moment till he releases Sean's hands have him pinned better than before, tight and he's not moving unless he's allowed.  
  
"You can keep struggling if you want," Sean says, breath hot against Jonny's ear. "Don't mind the way it makes your arse rub up against me. Don't mind it at all." He grinds forward, well aware of how it's pressing the front of Jonny's body into the bricks, how it's going to be crushing his cock between brick and body. It's not enough, not even close, but it's a start.  
  
Jonny bucks back at the words, giving Sean what he says he wants. Fight. And his cock gets harder, buttons shoved inward, and his body finds a niche, corner of broken brick, just enough, almost, to rub instead of crush. But the grinding's too steady, Sean's hold too tight. Hands are free, though, and he clutches backward, randomly grasping for whatever strike he can get in.  
  
Getting hit doesn't matter, getting hurt doesn't matter. Sean even gives Jonny a little more space, because he's got to get his hands between Jonny and the wall. Needs to get the jeans unbuttoned and tugged down over hips, first off.  
  
Fingers deft work buttons as Jonny lurches back from the wall, not going anywhere, and there's a quick rush of cooling night air over his cock as the denim's pulled aside. "Fuck," he lets out a breath, sucks it back in, allowing it all feels too damned good. Too quick. It's dawning on Jonny he's never had anyone like this before, not someone who'll match him move for move, take him down no how much he fights. _Oh, it's gonna be a good night._  
  
As soon as Jonny's jeans are down, Sean reaches into his own for a condom, using his teeth to tear the packet open and then unbuttoning his own fly one-handed, dragging his cock out. He shoves Jonny back into the wall, kicking his legs as far apart as they'll go, and bites at the back of his neck. _Mine for the night._  
  
"Christfuckinghell," Jonny blurts, cock slammed against chipping brick. _That's gonna hurt. Something good._ His legs are apart and he's off-balance, for a second, quickly regaining, hands sprawling on the wall to counterbalance, sensations coming in waves. Cock hard, crushed. Body vulnerable. And then there's the bite. "Ohfuck." It cuts in, even though Sean has to nudge aside the collar-shag blond-tipped hair.  
  
"That an offer?" Sean asks. "A request?" He pulls back just enough to roll the condom on, and then his cock's sliding down into Jonny's cleft, head pressing against the tight pucker there. He gets his arms up again, covers Jonny's wrists with his hands, pins him. It wouldn't matter if the lights were high and someone were watching, taking pictures, taking notes. _I'm having this boy. Here, now. Like this._  
  
"Both." Jonny's breathing gets more ragged as Sean pushes against him and he feels his body wanting to clench and open all at once. "You can fuckin' call it begging if you want."  
  
"Lad, that's not begging," Sean grins, sliding his hands down to Jonny's forearms, getting him pinned just a little more securely. "We'll both know begging when we get there." And then -- _then_ it's a rough move forward, all at once, hips forcing his cock in deep. It only gets him in a couple of inches before he has to stop. " _Fuck_ , you're tight."  
  
 _Yeah, we will_ , Jonny thinks, knowing that he knows damned well what begging is, how it swirls off the tongue, straight up from the cock bypassing all rational thought. And this ain't it. Not yet. Sean's right. He's tight. Painfully so. "Too many nights of _not_ getting fucked and just taking the beating," he murmurs into brick.  
  
"Bloody waste of talent," Sean breathes, barely aware of what he's saying. He's busy moving his hips back, shoving forward again. There's nowhere for Jonny to go; he's already pressed hard to brick. Doesn't matter. Sean's giving him as much as he can, as hard as he can, and another few inches feels like a victory here.  
  
Jonny's taking it, along with the compliment, both reeling his body and brain, and he's pressing into the brick, soaking up the scratches, yielding his body almost unconsciously.  
  
Hands down to hips now, dragging them back for a better angle as Sean grits his teeth and forces his way all the way in. " _Fuck_ yes," he pants, "open up, come on, fucking _open_ for me."  
  
Letting his body be moved, angled, Jonny stretches his back, head against the wall, hands not moving from where Sean left them. "Yessir, godyes, fuck," he murmurs, louder with each word, not giving a damn if everyone in the club's come out to watch. He just wants the abuse, the use. He spreads his legs, then suddenly hits on a notion.  
  
Face wedged into chipping mortar, right shoulder taking most of his weight, Jonny slides his hands down the wall, to his back, struggling with the odd angle, fingers clutching at his ass, grasping at the flesh, pulling his cheeks apart wider. "Open," he gasps for air. "Yes, sir."  
  
"Christ, fuck," Sean pants, openmouthed, cock jerking so hard he's amazed he's not coming just then and there. "Never -- oh, fuck--" And he plants a hand between Jonny's shoulderblades, losing himself to the feeling, just moving in harder and harder 'til he thinks he's going to break one or both of them, and he doesn't care which.  
  
Jonny's breaking, or at least getting dented a good bit, his shoulder pushing in on brick that's cutting through the fabric stretched too tight. Blood's trickling down his chest. Doesn't matter. Not to him. He pulls himself open wider, as wide as possible, pushing back as much as the angle will allow, hurting himself as much as Sean's hurting him. "Christ, yes, that's it." His voice is ragged, his breathing barely there, pants and gasps, and his cock's sliding against mortar, body on the edge of coming hard.  
  
Forehead resting against the back of his hand, body arching and twisting as he forces his cock deeper into Jonny ( _God -- this deep -- never -- fuck_ ), Sean's whole body feels focused on his cock, all the stress, frustration, anger of the last days, weeks, maybe _months_ coming out in this fuck. _Everything_ he's needed to get out of his system and never found a home for, and now he's just breathing it in, the relief so harsh it hurts. He doesn't want to stop. Never wants to stop.  
  
"Goddamnfuckhell." Jonny's screaming against the brick as Sean pushes deeper. Swears he can feel it in his spine, shivering up, splitting him. _Never. Not like this. Hurts so damned good._  
  
"Like this," Sean pants, "you better be able to come like this," and he draws out almost all the way, feels Jonny's arse trying to close past the head of his cock before driving in, slamming his hips so hard against Jonny's that he'll have bruises on his hipbones from the impact. Bruises he can dig his thumbs into and remember.  
  
 _Bruises he'll see and hate you for--_  
  
The orgasm tears out of Sean so hard he sees stars, and he's screaming, getting his teeth on Jonny's shoulder to blunt the sounds, biting down hard.  
  
Fuck, yes, he can come just like this. He shifts, throwing his weight a bit more solidly into his shoulder, ignoring the searing pain, cock slammed into brick, and he screams to match Sean's cries, coming hard, cock jerking and pulsing with an orgasm stronger than any he's ever known. He can feel the bruises, shoves back into them, demanding they be deeper, so black he can see them without a mirror, know they're there with every step he takes.  
  
Sean doesn't come back to himself right away. He doesn't want to come back to himself at all. He's exhausted, shaking, bruised, covered in sweat, probably stained with blood, and he doesn't want to come down from it. He bites into Jonny's shoulder again, slow and deep, wishing he were hard enough to just keep going. _Oh, to be twenty again._  
  
Jonny lets his hands fall slack, drop to his side, body go limp under the weight pressing against him. The bite counterbalances the brick chip and both sides of Jonny's shoulder are throbbing, blood dripping down his chest, matting his shirt. There's blood on his face; he can feel the sandy grit mixing with it. And it's elsewhere, too, he knows, not having to see it, his body ragged from the intense use. It flashes through his brain that he doesn't want Sean to move, to step away. In part because he's not sure he can stand up on his own. And, then there's the not wanting it to end.  
  
Sean holds onto Jonny's hips, squeezing tight. It takes him a while to decide whether to say it or not, and finally he does -- "needed that," he whispers, "thank you."  
  
"Any time," Jonny murmurs, wincing at the laying down of fresh bruises over ones only minutes old. "Here most nights."  
  
The offer gets in under Sean's chest and _twists_ , somehow. He takes a breath, wondering how serious an offer it is. How soon he'll need to be back here.  
  
"I come here when I have to," he says, "but it's been more often lately."  
  
Finding his breath, slowly in and out, Jonny finds a bit more voice. "Come here to shoot pool, unwind," he says, "get away from real life."  
  
 _And what's real life that it leaves you wanting this?_ Sean wonders, licking his way across the back of Jonny's neck, fingers tangling in hair as he pushes it aside. _But then, he could ask the same of me, couldn't he..._ He pulls back, wincing at the blood on the condom before stripping it off and leaving it on the gravel. "I know what you mean," he says instead.  
  
Jonny shivers, the tender touch of a lick almost too much for his nerves to take. He wants to ask _Will I get this again? From you? Only here?_ but nothing comes out that makes sense. Just a whimper followed by a hissing as he shifts his weight and reality sinks in. _Fuck, don't tell me I dislocated it._  
  
"You need something?" Sean asks, feeling awkward about the question. He's never asked it before.  
  
"Pop my shoulder back in?" Jonny says matter-of-factly, like it happens all the time. Doesn't. Well, not _all_ the time. This one's a bit more out, it seems.  
  
"Um." Sean bites at his lower lip as he gets his clothes put back together. "Fuck, I didn't mean to..." It's not like he hasn't seen this before, hell, hasn't had it happen to him, needed to put joints back where they belong after a particularly rough game of footie, but he's never done it this way before. He gets his hands on Jonny's arm and rocks it back, wincing; _fuck, that has to hurt._  
  
"Fuck," Jonny screams and then bites back the rest of it. It hurts. Damn, it hurts. And it's gonna be hell working tomorrow, but right now he's not thinking beyond Sean's hands on his shoulder and _not_ passing out. "Thanks," he winces, breathes out.  
  
 _Tough little bastard._ Sean grins, slides his tongue out over his lips. "Yeah," he says softly. _Christ -- fuck. What time is it?_ The thought gets in before Sean can wave it off, and he glances at his watch. Almost one. " _Fuck_."  
  
"What?" Jonny's rolling to his side, grimacing with each move. _Forget driving home. Shit._ He manages a smile. "S'not that bad. Think I can avoid the ER tonight."  
  
"It's not that," Sean winces. "It's the hour." It's the hour and not wanting to go home. Looking for any excuse not to. "I..." He doesn't even know the protocol for this. _Ask him if he wants another drink? If he wants a ride home?_ "You want anything?" he asks.  
  
"Uh, ride home would be nice. Shoulder's not gonna handle steering for a couple hours." Jonny's not sure if he should ask. "But if you gotta get home, that's cool. I can grab Luke and get him to take me."  
  
"I can take you," Sean says immediately. "You need to rest a while first? Finish that beer?" _Make it more obvious, Bean, that you don't want what's waiting for you at home. Christ._  
  
Jonny lets out a long breath, makes a move to stand away from the wall. "Yeah, beer would be good. Smoke would be nice. Hell, morphine would be fuckin' fantastic." He grins. "And, thanks, for the offer."  



	2. Never Expected To See You Again

A week goes by before Sean pulls into the gravel lot at the bar on the rough end of town. He's made it an entire week of crashing paint cans and boring, mindless work on spreadsheets. Part of him's kicking himself for giving in and going this early, and part of him knows he's got good reason for it. _"Just go. I know you want to go. Just get the fuck out already."_  
  
He lights a cigarette on the doorstep to the bar and then heads inside, nodding to the bartender as he takes a table; he'll have someone send over a beer as soon as he can.  
  
Jonny looks up as the door opens. Has been for days. Wondering if he'd come back, or it'd just been a one-off thing. He smiles and nods to Mike, the bartender, that he'll take care of the guy. He pulls a beer and heads over to the table Sean's picked, one pretty close to where they'd sat the first night.  
  
"First one's on me tonight," he says, setting the glass down. "Still owe you for the ride."  
  
"You don't owe me anything," Sean says, mouth on autopilot to cover for the fact that this, _this_ face, is what he's doing at the bar tonight. "Sit down?"  
  
"Sure," Jonny says, trying to leave it flat, not show how excited he is that Sean walked into the bar or asked him to sit down. He pulls out a chair and settles into it, sprawling a good bit, working his neck around. The jeans are just as worn, the shirt long-sleeve this week, covering a multitude of barely fading bruises and one stitched shoulder. "How's things?"  
  
Sean gives him a rueful look. "Wouldn't be here if they were going well," he admits softly. "It's been a rougher go these last few days, weeks, months. How about you?"  
  
"Went through crap with the old man this week, but other than that it's okay." Jonny shrugs. "You needing to get it out again? Hurt someone?"  
  
"You want it again?" Sean asks. His cock's already getting hard. _How much could you take?_  
  
"Wouldn't say no to it." Jonny bites at his lip. "Never had it quite as good as you gave. Powerful combo you got."  
  
"Never had anyone take it that way before," Sean says. "Sure as hell never had anyone ask for more. But not the wall this time."  
  
"Not the wall. Sure." Jonny laughs. He's rather glad Sean doesn't want the wall again. He's not quite ready to explain to the doc-in-a-box twice in one week why his shoulder has a gash and he's bruised from head to waist. "Uh, we could, um, you could follow me to my place if you want."  
  
Surprise flashes over Sean's face for half a second before he thinks it over. _What more could you do to him than you've already done? What's he got left to be afraid of?_ "Yeah," he says softly. _In a bed for once. That's going to be a change of pace._ "Think I can give you what you're looking for if we don't have gravel to play with?" he asks, smiling just a little.  
  
"I got a wall and a floor, even a bed if you want," Jonny says, running a hand through his uncombed hair, "and I think you'll give me whatever you got."  
  
"Yeah." Sean's tongue comes out over his lips, and he nods. "Your place. Sounds good."  
  
"Wanna finish your beer? I don't have it on tap at the apartment."  
  
Sean laughs. "Yeah." He digs through pockets for a cigarette and lighter, and relaxes just a fraction as he lights up his cigarette. There's an impulse to move for small talk, to at least try to say something other than _so why do you need it as hard as I need to give it?_ or _how badly banged around were you after the last time, and why do you want it all over again?_ , but Sean's tongue feels awkward in his mouth, and he stays quiet.  
  
"Should I avoid the small talk? Or do we not go beyond first names?" Jonny's fidgeting, neither beer nor cigarette to occupy his hands. He doesn't know what he'd say if they're supposed to talk about anything else. Explain why he's bartending instead of studying for exams, living in a studio apartment instead of his parents' house in Malibu. Or do they get into why he wants to be banged around till he can't walk.  
  
"I don't know -- I've never talked to someone I met this way before," Sean admits, leaning forward on his elbows. "I don't know what the protocol is, what the rules are. Fuck, breaking enough rules just by being here, I probably shouldn't worry..." Another drag, just to give him something to do other than talk.  
  
"Breaking rules by being here?" That makes Jonny nervous. "I'm not gonna get you in trouble, am I?" _Fuck, don't need that. Still haven't gotten over the shit with Angie._ "I mean, I can go back to the bar, leave you be."  
  
"Please don't go." Sean could kick himself. "You're not getting me in trouble." _This is why I never know whether to talk about anything other than how hard and is that enough..._ "I can't -- I have to get out here or I crack. Can't take it out on the guy I live with, so I come here and try to work it out of my system--" _and I go home and things are worse, and..._ "--and it makes it all seem all right, for a while." Christ, he's never said that to anyone.  
  
"Okay. Not going." Jonny sucks in a breath, takes in the words. "I understand. Needing to let it out. Nowhere else to do it. No one who'll take it." He smiles, half-cocked twitch of lips. "Or give it to you. Things that bad?"  
  
"For a while now," Sean says, rubbing at his upper arms, suddenly feeling cold. "What about you?" he asks. "Is there someone at home waiting for you?" _What am I walking into if I let you take me home?_  
  
Jonny laughs. "No." _Not since she kicked me out for fucking her brother._ "Place is barely big enough for me. And I didn't exactly ace my last relationship, so flying solo at the moment."  
  
"How are your wings?" Sean asks, bit of humor reaching his eyes. He points with his beer bottle at Jonny's shoulder, the one he had to press back into place after the last time. "Did you come out all right after the last time...?"  
  
"It's okay." Jonny looks down, away from Sean's eyes. "Needed a couple stitches just to make sure it closed, but nothing broken."  
  
The soft grunt Sean lets out is as involuntary as the way his cock hardens in his jeans. _Stitches? And he's after you again. Christ._ He takes a long drink of his beer, trying to figure out if there's a good way to say any of the things he's thinking.  
  
"Don't know about leaving you to need stitches this time," he says, finally, "but I want to hurt you again. Want it badly." The hand tangled up in his cigarette slides between his legs, ash cindering down onto his thigh as he squeezes his cock to relieve part of the ache he's feeling. _Stitches._  
  
"Want it, too, badly," Jonny echoes, "and if I need more stitches, that's," he pauses, blushes just a little, "it's alright. Doc-in-the-box guy's got a thing for me. Doesn't mind stitching me up." He watches Sean's movements, tracks his hand, finds himself wondering what it'd be like to have those ashes falling over his skin. _Fuck, Miller, that's almost too intense._ He shifts. "You 'bout finished?" he asks, way too eagerly.  
  
"I'm done," Sean confirms, uncurling himself from the chair. "Show me where we're going. No, wait--" He doesn't want to walk out of this bar without touching Jonny at least once. He gets a hand on the back of Jonny's neck, pulls him up and close. "Fucking want you," he murmurs.  
  
"Fuck," Jonny spits out, Sean's move sudden and marginally unexpected. "You can have me. Right here if you want." He's breathing hard, neck clenched against Sean's fingers. "Although not sure Mike would appreciate a middle-of-the-bar fuck this early in the evening."  
  
"Maybe not," Sean agrees, sliding forward anyway, pressing the backs of Jonny's thighs into their table. "I could have you that way. Hands braced on the bar. Legs spread wide. One foot between your legs and up on the rail, while I'm slamming into you and you're asking for more."  
  
"Hell, yeah, you could have me that way." _And we can do it, too, here or you come to the bar I work after hours._ Jonny's not squirming as much as just letting himself be moved, positioned, and he really wouldn't stop Sean from taking him right now, right here 'cause the visual he's painting as the young man harder than the table's edge he's backed into.  
  
"But I want you stretched out on a bed," Sean whispers, squeezing the back of Jonny's neck, leaning forward just a little more to lick at his lips. And then bite them. Hard. Teeth sinking into lower lip and holding. "Want you somewhere you can scream all day and not draw a second's notice," he breathes, when he finally lets up.  
  
Pain. There it is again. The bite. Centering him, shuddering through him. What this man can do to him. "All day," Jonny echoes. "Scream. Yeah. Neighborhood can handle it." He's a bit dazed as he steps back, Sean letting up. "Car's outside. You wanna follow? Or I can just leave it here." _Sure, get to work somehow. Sometime tomorrow._  
  
"Up to you," Sean says softly. The ironic thing about this place is that for all the rough traffic it sees, it's a safe place to leave car or bags or whatever you have in hand when you go out to get fucked. The only thing the clientele cares about is what's under a man's trousers, not what sort of car he drives or what he might have in overnight duffel bags. "Probably won't be able to keep my hands off you if you're in my car, though."  
  
"Then I'll drive your car, we'll leave mine here," Jonny says, grinning, at the prospect of being mauled on the way home.  
  
"And you promise us both you won't let me run you off the road." Sean grins back. He digs keys out of his pocket and hands them over. "Out back. Blue Civic that's seen better days."  
  
Jonny snags the keys and heads toward the door. The Civic's parked two cars away from Jonny's hard-top Mustang, and he makes a quick detour to snag his backpack out of the trunk before sliding into the driver's side of Sean's car. "Not sure about promising to not run off the road," he says, turning over the engine, "but I'll make sure we total the car so you can get a new one if you like."  
  
"Why not? It'll keep me stuck here another five years while I'm trying to pay off this one." Sean adjusts the seat up a little, not being inclined to sprawl as much as his lover does. "Maybe I'll get something more fuel-efficient to make the lover happy."  
  
"You want, we could drive to your place and run over the lover," Jonny quips, almost regretting saying it as the words come out. "Sorry," he pulls out of the bar parking lot, melds into traffic, light this time of night. "Shouldn't've said that. Lover and all, he is."  
  
"Lover and all, he is," Sean murmurs, running his hand up Jonny's thigh. "Maybe it's better not to bring it up, yeah? Came into the bar in a bad mood and it's been getting better so far."  
  
Jonny moves his thigh under Sean's fingers, spreading his legs wider, saying the silent _thank God for automatic transmission_ prayer, and keeps his eyes on the road. "Don't know. I kinda like your bad moods. They leave me covered in brick dust."  
  
"I like whatever it is that makes you like my bad moods," Sean responds, fingers moving higher, pressing down hard over Jonny's cock and squeezing. "Bad moods of your own?"  
  
His foot presses a bit harder on the gas, which is fine considering there's no one in front of them, and it takes a second for Jonny to adjust, pull back. "Yeah. Bad moods. Got a shitty life, trying to make it work."  
  
"Sounds like all of us," Sean says, snapping off his seatbelt and leaning in. He bites hard at the side of Jonny's neck, squeezes his cock again. "Get me back to your place. Don't want to wait much longer."  
  
"Fuckin' hell. You didn't say it was gonna be all-out assault," Jonny nearly shouts, hands clutching the wheel. He thinks. "Okay." Swerves into the turn lane and takes the left, cutting through a couple back streets. Much as he joked about totalling the car, he's really _not_ wanting to wreck. "Five minutes. Give me that, and I'll have you at the door."  
  
Sean chuckles against Jonny's skin. "You've got five minutes. You want me to stop?" Hand moves up from cock to chest, thumb rubs over a nipple and Sean threatens a pinch, not quite doing it. "Want me to sit down and keep us out of trouble?"  
  
"No, don't stop." _Christ, don't stop._ Jonny makes another turn, thinking for a second it's the wrong one, Sean's hand distracting him beyond imagination. _No, this is right. Yeah._ "Don't think you stopping's gonna keep us out of trouble anyhow."  
  
The words flash and burn, and Sean bites harder, squeezing thumb and forefinger together and giving a rough pinch through Jonny's shirt. "Little late for that," he agrees, growling softly.  
  
 _Fuckin' late._ Bite centers, but the pinch throws him off, and Jonny's concentrating as much as he can on the road. There's a turn he has to make. One more. But his cock's aching and his legs can't spread any wider, not in the confines of the damned seat, and _oh, fuck_ , he manages to turn right again without killing them. He smiles. Then it's a quick left into the driveway and he's breathing out as he slides the Civic into the asphalt pad at the back of the house.  
  
As soon as the engine's cut, Sean slides fingers into Jonny's hair and forces him to half-turn, moving him so Sean can get his lips on Jonny's and cut into that lower lip with his teeth. _Fucking want you._ And he doesn't really give a damn whether they make it out of the car at this point; they're here, semi-secluded, and he's growling in the back of his throat.  
  
Jonny fumbles, hand grasping for the seat controls, just to get it far enough back not to hit the horn. _Fuck, don't need to wake 'em up. Not now. She'll shoot me._ He manages, the seat moving back, and hands find new adventures on Sean's chest, tugging at the shirt. "Want," he slurs into the kiss-bite. "Here? Out?"  
  
"Anywhere. Over the fucking hood." Sean's half-pulled himself on top of Jonny, one hand still in his hair, the other working its way down his chest again, sliding between his legs. "Everything."  
  
Hood. Jonny thinks. _It's still hot. Burns._ His smile widens. "Fuck, yeah," he says, one hand push-pulling at Sean and the other blindly grabbing the door handle, opening, nearly falling back with the tug of the door opening. "Over the hood. Do it."  
  
Sean pulls away and shoves Jonny toward the door. "Go. Get your pants around your thighs. Spread yourself for me." He's moving for the trunk, yanking the keys out of the ignition so he can get it open.  
  
The shove's enough to tumble Jonny out of the car and he fall-slides to the asphalt, scrambling to right himself. Everything's rushed. Hurried. Happening so fast. He pulls himself up to standing and unbuttons his jeans as he moves to the front of the car. Down over hips, tugging briefs with the denim, jerked to mid-thigh, enough to put his legs apart, stretch out over the hood. _Fuck. Hot._ Jonny hisses out a breath, letting the heat soak through his shirt as he lays himself down. Hands go back and he's spreading himself, fingers clutching at the cleft, pulling the flesh apart, exposing puckered hole. He's standing back, cock hanging hard outside the denim, brushing against the car's grill as he spreads his legs wider, waiting.  
  
Sean comes back, looking at what Jonny's giving him, cock so hard it's jerking in his jeans and hurting like hell, ready to take, fuck, open Jonny up and hurt him.  
  
He's got a length of chain wrapped around his fist, and he catches the trailing end of it with his other hand, looping it around his fingers. "Want you holding still," he murmurs, resting one hand on the hood next to Jonny's shoulder as he presses against Jonny's thighs, against his arse, denim scratching and rubbing.  
  
Jonny catches sight of the chain in his peripheral vision, taking Sean at his word, not moving, not even flinching. He's ready to be laid open, fucked hard, beaten to hell and back. "Yessir," he murmurs, face already feeling the engine's lingering burn.  
  
And it's just that easy, letting go of every fucking inhibition he's ever had, wrapping that chain around Jonny's neck and holding -- loose for now, but holding both ends in one hand. The other hand's digging into a pocket for a condom, which he holds between his teeth before jerking open his fly and taking his cock out, sliding it along Jonny's cleft.  
  
That's a new sensation. Metal on his throat. Loose, but heavy. Jonny shakes his head, slowly, fighting the body's instinct to move his hands, clutch at the links. And then, suddenly, the fear's gone. Five seconds is all it got. It's replaced by need, desire, the nudge of Sean's cock at his ass. He concentrates on that, rocking back in a nuance of shifting, just to say _yeah, go ahead, do it_ without the words.  
  
Keeping the loose pressure on Jonny's throat while tearing into the condom's not easy, but Sean's got this far; he gets the condom slicked down his shaft and presses up against Jonny's arse all over again, arching his hips, wrapping his hand around his cock and pressing _in_. It's just as rough and difficult as it was the first time, and the memory of that -- of tearing his way into Jonny's body --makes his eyes close, makes his hand tighten on the chain around Jonny's throat. " _Fuck,_ " he breathes. "Christ, you're so fucking tight."  
  
Jonny could explain that he hasn't been fucked since Sean, not that it'd matter. Moot point. He's tight and it's hurting like a dream that Sean's cock is burrowing into him. Just the way he wants it to hurt. He moans, the chain tightening. _Fuck, that's intense. Like it. Okay, maybe._ And he makes the breath count.  
  
Half of Sean wants to hear Jonny screaming; the other half of him just wants to cut off his air, feel the struggle under his body, fuck him with everything he's got and not stop 'til he thinks he's near to passing out. "Mine," he breathes, and then again, louder, giving Jonny a breath, " _mine_."  
  
Gasping into the breath, Jonny finds it gone all too quickly, and then the struggle's back, hands clutching his body, holding himself. _Yours? Yours._ And the scream's gurgling in his throat, confined by chain links, begging in whimpers and undulations to be released just as his body's begging, rocking back, yearning to be abused.  
  
"Christ. Come on." Sean reaches under Jonny, gets his hand between Jonny's stomach and the car's hood and works his way down. He wraps a hand around Jonny's cock, hissing as the back of his hand heats against metal, and leans in further to bite at Jonny's shoulder. His grip on the chain tightens that much more. " _Mine._ "  
  
"Yours," Jonny gasps, vision darkening, brain fogging. There's no focus, other than the pressure of metal, the bruising hug of flesh, the warmth from inside his body threatening to zero out the hood's heat. He wants to come, wants to beg to come, just wants, but there's no coherent thought pattern, nothing but the sensation of floating, of falling, of not caring how much he hurts in another 10 minutes.  
  
 _Want. So much. Everything._ Sean wraps the chain around his hand one more time, pulls back hard on it. "So close," he whispers, "come with me, want to feel you come with me--" And he can't hold back; he _needs_ too much, can feel the need through his entire body as he comes, knowing damn well that this isn't going to be enough, nowhere near enough.  
  
That does the trick. Words, cock wedged into him, chain jerking back. Jonny comes. Or he imagines he does. He's almost too far gone to know, vision blinding white on the blackness, and his cock's jerking, pulsing, white streams over Sean's fingers, the Civic's blue finish. Pain-laced blackness engulfing his senses. _So fuckin' good._  
  
Sean lets the chain go, listens to it rattle against the hood as he slides his fingers over Jonny's neck. He can almost feel the imprints he's made, almost see the bruises on his skin. He pulls out, grabs Jonny and shoves at him. "Turn over." Urgent, rough and half-desperate to see those bruises. " _Over._ "  
  
 _Over. Over? That's somewhere opposite from here._ Jonny moves more slowly than Sean's voice demands, but he can't think straight enough to figure out which way to move. But he does turn over, sprawling on the car's hood, arms splayed now, back taking up the remaining heat. The smile's faint, head tilted back, eyes fixed on Sean's face.  
  
And God, that _smile._ Sean stretches out over Jonny's body, pins his wrists to the hood as he leans in and licks his way across Jonny's throat.  
  
Jonny's whole body reacts, one long, languid shiver. _That_ touch. Hypersensitizing him. Making him crave more.  
  
"You're marked all over again," Sean murmurs. "Is it going to get you into trouble?"  
  
Oxygen's coming back to his brain. Slowly. Seeping in. "No," he whispers, as much voice as he has, "high collars at the club. Nobody else cares."  
  
Sean's lips slant over Jonny's all over again, biting, long slow bites between slower, rougher kisses. _Don't want to go. Don't want to leave here._  
  
"Upstairs," Jonny gets out, another few breaths taken in. "Wanna drink?"  
  
"Yeah," Sean breathes. _A drink, a bed, the rest of the night._  
  
"Okay. A minute. I can move." Jonny's breathing is still raspy but coming back. "Need my backpack outta the car."  
  
"You can move? I'm not doing it right this time," Sean jokes. He lifts himself off Jonny and steps back, cleaning himself up as best he can. Definitely not thinking further ahead than the next five minutes.  
  
Jonny's nearly the next five minutes peeling himself from the hood, adjusting clothes. He knows the skin under his shirt is fire. He can feel it, soaking through the cotton. A little aloe, he thinks, yeah, that'll do the trick. He sucks in a deep breath and moves to car door, still open, reaching in and snagging his backpack from the floor. A quick dig inside the outer pocket and he has keys in hand and is heading for the stairs.  
  
Sean follows after, watching the way Jonny's moving -- hurt enough to feel after, he realizes, and he's wondering all over again what it is that has this boy needing it as badly as he does. _Maybe I'll ask. Maybe once we're inside he'll want to tell me._  
  
Key's in, door's open and Jonny's stepping inside, clicking on the overhead light. It's an over-the-garage setup, a studio apartment if you believe the ads. Mostly it's cheap 'cause his sister owns it, lives in the big house out front, let him move in when Angie kicked him out and lets him live here just for utilities. And when you don't have cable TV, don't turn on the lights that often and use a mobile phone, utilities-living can be damned cheap.  
  
"It's not much," he says, dropping his backpack. The layout's simple. One huge room, partitioned off by freestanding walls and screens and hanging stained glass, kitchen on this end, makeshift living room and bedroom on the far end, bathroom off to the right of it. The decor is Salvation Army chic, somewhere between retro and dorm room. "Just make yourself at home. I'll grab us a couple beers."  
  
Sean glances around. It looks like the place he lived in before he moved cross-continent, the kind of place he might have looked for if he'd been moving to the States on his own terms instead of moving across the ocean for a lover. It's not bad. He takes his jacket off, first time he's done that all evening, and eases himself down on the bed, hoping the offer for all this was sincere. At least for a few minutes, at least long enough for a drink. "It's good," he calls out, "it's a good place."  
  
"Thanks," Jonny calls back, having retrieved two beers from the fridge. He walks from kitchen area to living room, but doesn't find Sean and keeps moving past the screen and large armoire partitioning off the bedroom. He's all smiles when he sees Sean stretched out on the bed. "It's nice," he says, handing over one of the beers. "Better than where I got kicked out of actually, and long as I keep a low profile, I get to stay just for the cost of utilities."  
  
Sean whistles. "Good deal," he says. His curiosity's piqued, and he's been keeping his mouth shut all evening; it can't hurt to ask. The worst he'll get is a _none of your business_. "Kicked out of where?"  
  
"Huh?" Jonny shrugs, sits down on the bed's edge. He knows what the question was. _Hell, he's fucked you twice. Ought to get some private info._ "Most recently out of my girlfriend's place. She got all in a wad 'cause I was fucking her brother. Before that, daddy was kind enough to boot me out of Malibu for thinking about fucking the pool boy."  
  
Sean can't decide whether to grin, laugh, or shake his head; he does some of all three while popping the top off the beer, pausing just long enough to take a sip. "Any of that have anything to do with why you need it the way we've been doing it?" he asks. "Or are you just wired that way?"  
  
"Just wired that way." Jonny sips at his beer. "Dad says my wiring's fucked up. Definitely not into the alternative lifestyle. Been kinked since I was 15. Don't think I'm growing out of it, no matter how much he thinks his tough love's gonna straighten out the heir."  
  
"Yeah," Sean says softly, reaching out to run a hand up Jonny's arm. "I was supposed to settle down, too. Outgrow some things." He shrugs. "Looks like it isn't happening."  
  
"Well, I've got a few years. Not officially disowned yet. Not till I'm 25." Jonny almost jumps at the soft touch, and then he's looking at Sean through veiled eyes, dark eyes. "Don't want to outgrow it. I _like_ what you do to me. I've had lots of guys hurt me. Not one had me wanting to come back crawling like I've been all week."  
  
Sean lets his fingers move across Jonny's chest, and they twist into his shirt, tugging him closer. "Wanted you again," he breathes. "Not just anyone else. You. I like what you give me. It was worth the fight when I got home last time. Got me through the week."  
  
"You got into a fight because of me? And you still want me?"  
  
"All the things I had stored up," Sean says, leaning up, pressing his lips against Jonny's neck, "all the hurt and the frustration, all the things I didn't know how to handle. They were gone with you." He licks over the bruises on Jonny's neck again, shivering hard. "I'd sleep in the fucking car every night for a month for that."  
  
"Don't have to sleep in the car tonight," Jonny offers quickly, without thinking. And then he's wondering if he shouldn't've, if it's too much, but he lets it stand, doesn't back off.  
  
Sean closes his eyes. Can it get much worse, he thinks, going home in the morning instead of going home now?  
  
His teeth sink into the side of Jonny's neck, half-gentle, half-threat. "You'd let me stay?"  
  
 _I'd beg you not to go_ , Jonny thinks, the bite distracting him, making him almost hard again when it shouldn't be able to. "To keep you from sleeping in the car, yeah. You can stay."  
  
Sean puts his bottle down on the floor; tugs Jonny's out of his hand and does the same for it. He gets an arm around Jonny and pulls him back flat on the bed, rolling over on him. "I'd like that," he whispers.  
  
"There's a price," Jonny says, almost hesitantly, shifting against the bed under Sean's weight. "Hurt me more. Take out the rest of whatever anger you've got built up this week before you fall asleep."  
  
Sean's blood ices over at the words _there's a price_ , and then cinders with the words _hurt me more_. He buries his face in Jonny's shoulder for a moment, struggling to keep himself together. He's lived with prices on things for the last year and a half, but they've never felt like this.  
  
His breath is warm and soft as he turns his head, nods against Jonny's skin. "All right," he whispers. And his cock's agreeing with him on it; he's starting to get hard again. He reaches down for Jonny's hands and pins them up above his head. "You want it, it's all yours," he says, easing himself up so he can look into Jonny's eyes.  
  
"Thank you," he says, almost too softly, his cock pressing up against the loosened constraint of half-buttoned jeans. He tugs his wrists, smiles when he realizes just how hard a grip Sean has on them. _Not going anywhere, Miller. Not till he lets you._ Once, for maybe a week, he'd wished he wasn't wired this way, that the pain didn't get him hard, the bruising get him off. Then he realized it didn't matter, let it all go and relaxed into who he is, _what_ he is. Queer boy who looks good black and blue. "Unleash it, Sean."  
  
And Sean does: thigh levered down to the point of pain against Jonny's cock, fingers digging into wrists and bruising, lips brushing over chain-link marks on Jonny's neck as Sean licks at the marks he left before. His own cock's pressing against his jeans, aching to be buried in Jonny all over again. It's like slipping between the hours, into a place where time doesn't matter and he can give _this_ to someone, this way, ignore the fact that violence and sex aren't supposed to go together -- not if you're healthy, sane and stable. It's so easy. So easy. "Christ, want you so much," Sean breathes, biting into the side of Jonny's neck.  
  
Jonny arches up, wanting more contact, more pressure, more pain. Just more of Sean. He's caught in a vortex, spiraling down like never before. He jerks his wrists, causing Sean to counter, pin him more forcibly, and then he tilts back his head, letting Sean's lips, teeth graze over the chain's indentures. He wonders how permanent they'll be. Not that the Mythos crowd will care. Weird goth bunch anyway. "Take me, then," he urges. "C'mon, wanna be naked. Wanna feel you against me, skin to skin. Now."  
  
"Fuck, yes," Sean pants, pushing up, stripping out of his shirt in one fast movement. He stands up to kick out of his shoes, to shove his jeans down to the floor and step out of them. He wonders if Jonny's going to notice the long, jagged scar on his inner thigh or the tattoo on his left arm, and if he'll care enough to wonder about either.  
  
Hands released, Jonny skims out of his shirt as he sits up, wincing when the cotton rubs over a red patch of skin on his stomach. The he tugs off the jeans, tossing them over the bed's end along with the sneakers he's toeing out of as he strips, going up on his knees at the last. He rubs his hand over Sean's left arm, tracing the tattoo. "Nice. What's it mean?"  
  
"Oh..." Sean grins down at him, liking the feel of Jonny's hand on his skin. "It's for the football club I used to follow. Haven't seen a match since I moved here. Don't have a television at home."  
  
"Football?" Jonny thinks a minute. "What we call soccer. Right?" He palms the words, pulls his hand down Sean's arm to his wrist, then fingers, lacing them and pulling Sean's hand up to his chest. "I've got a couple, on my back, nothing too important."  
  
Sean squeezes Jonny's fingers tight, rubbing his thumb over Jonny's chest. "Show me," he breathes. He's glancing at Jonny's chest, the marks left by last time, the place where stitches held together broken skin after Sean fucked Jonny into the wall. It's fascinating thinking about where he might be marked other than what Sean's given him, and Sean's willing to wait on the sex to get to know Jonny's body that much better.  
  
He turns slowly, letting Sean's hand trace over his shoulder until his fingers are on Jonny's back. "The cuffs were for my 21st birthday. Angie's brother did 'em," he says about the unlocked handcuffs on his right shoulder. "The rat on the left was the first one I got, trade-out for sex."  
  
Pressing Jonny forward a little, until there's room for both of them on the bed, Sean curls himself around Jonny's body, licking over the cuffs first, tracing the curve of them. He's not sure he trusts himself to speak; he lets his teeth scrape over the cuffs as his hands move up Jonny's sides to his arms.  
  
Jonny moans at the scraping. No one's ever -- not like that -- and it's, oh fuck, so good. "More. Mark me." He splays himself, stretching under Sean's body, arms outstretched and legs opening. "Want you inside me again. Hard, like before. Hurting."  
  
If there was any part of Sean that wondered if what he and Jonny have been doing is all right -- if what he's been doing _to_ Jonny is all right -- it disappears like so much smoke under words like those. "How hard?" he breathes, moving his hips, getting the head of his cock snugged up against Jonny's opening. "This hard?"  
  
"Yeah," he says, quietly. "That hard." He swallows, knowing what he's offering. "There's condoms in a mesh basket under the bed's edge," almost under his voice, "if you want."  
  
Sean freezes with one hand moving up to pin Jonny's upper arm to the bed and the other still between them, wrapped around his cock. _Fuck. Not thinking._ "Do you want me to stop?" he whispers.  
  
"Don't have to. I'm clean, if you're concerned 'bout that," Jonny says, trying not to push back too much. _Fuck, I want it. Just like this._ "Depends on how safe you wanna play. Drawing blood as it is."  
  
"Don't really want to stop now," Sean says, tightening his grip on Jonny's arm and shoving in to just past the head of his cock. " _Christ_ , you're so fucking hot..."  
  
"Then goddamnit, don't," Jonny spits out, pushing back. It's not safe. It's not sane. And it sure as hell ain't stable. But, fuck it, it's pretty damned consensual. "Want. It. Now."  
  
"All yours," Sean growls, teeth clenched together as he forces his way in. Jonny's still stretched a little from before, there's maybe a hint of lube, but not enough, nowhere _near_ enough. And all Sean wants is to be buried deep inside Jonny's skin. The rest of the world can go to hell.  
  
It's not a dry fuck, nowhere near it, but it hurts like one, Sean's cock pushing, inching in, demanding Jonny's body open. He does, or tries, shoving his legs farther apart, shoving hips up, angling down against his shoulders, any little shift that can help. "Fuck, that's, hurts, good."  
  
"Come on. Let me in. Need. Need it. _Fuck._ " Sean's sweating lightly by the time his cock is buried balls-deep in Jonny's arse, and he closes his eyes, shaking, taking a moment to recover.  
  
Jonny's panting for breath, refocusing, centering, finding the place where he can channel the pressure-pain of Sean's cock so deep, so thick and hard and filling him. "Got it. Oh, yeah. Fuck me, Sean. C'mon."  
  
Sean's name sounds better on Jonny's lips than it has any right to. And he braces himself on the bed, uses his knee to press Jonny's legs apart even further, one rough thrust following another until Sean's head is arching back and he's crying out with every thrust. It's so good it _hurts_ , and he doesn't want it to stop.  
  
Push. More. Back. Jonny's moving as much as he can, working Sean deeper, harder on every thrust. His breath is ragged, sometimes not coming at all, and he's not holding back the screams, just praying that in the dead of the night in LA, it all sounds normal to the neighbors.  
  
Sean wraps an arm around Jonny's chest, fingers splayed out over the center of it, drawing him back against his body. He can feel Jonny's heartbeat under his palm, fast as hell and in time with his own, and oh, God, the room could fucking catch fire and he wouldn't stop.  
  
Heartbeat's fast, and the room's spinning. Jonny's not touching ground at all, spiraling in the sensations. Sean's hands on him, cock in him, nothing between them. His body aches, every muscle and joint crying out for a moment's respite, and his cock's hard again. Shouldn't be. Don't want it to be. Hurts too much to think about coming.  
  
Another thrust, and another, working to get the angle just right, wanting more screams out of the man he's come home with, Sean digs his fingernails into Jonny's chest and drags them down, white lines tearing a path down Jonny's stomach as Sean bites into his shoulder. _Mine. Fucking mine._  
  
White lines turn pink, then red, and Jonny doesn't have to look down to know he's bleeding. The trickle's obvious, oozing down his chest. He screams, the pain perfect when it's overlaid with Sean's teeth. And there's more blood. From his shoulder. Skin broken, rivulets down his back. Doesn't care. Can't care. Jonny's getting what he wants, what he craves. "So close," he sputters. "Please. Can I come?" The words startle. He's never really _asked_ permission before, not in the exact words, not with anyone else.  
  
Sean smears his hand through the -- sweat? blood? -- on Jonny's chest and stomach, then wraps his hand around Jonny's cock. He's imagining bright red streaks up the length of it as he strokes, and he moans, licks up the blood he's drawn from Jonny's shoulder. "Come for me," he growls, picking up the pace that much more, wanting to make the shudders of Jonny's orgasm send him over.  
  
The orgasm's harder this time, too soon after the last, and more intense, pained pulses out over Sean's hand, slicking fingers with white streaks. His whole body shakes, convulses with the shivering of a sudden chill racing over him. "Fuck, hurts, love it," he screams, slamming his head back on Sean's shoulder. "Damnfuckingdamn."  
  
" _Fuck_ \--" Sean screams, fingers coated with Jonny's come and sliding down his cock, his own cock pulsing in response, body shuddering, feeling as if his whole body's coming, fire working its way down from the base of his neck all the way to his heels.  
  
Stuck to Jonny with their sweat, taste of Jonny's blood still in his mouth, his come marking Jonny from the inside as thoroughly as Jonny's come's marking his hand -- it's dizzying, and terrifying, and addictive as all hell. _Oh, fuck..._ Sean breathes out slowly, starting to come down. "Worth everything," he moans, wrapping an arm around Jonny's waist and holding him tight. " _Anything._ "


	3. Never Thought I'd Track You Down At Work

Sean turns the matchbook over in his fingers. The address is imprinted in his mind's eye, he doesn't need to look at the book, but he glances down anyway. It's comforting somehow, this scrap of cardboard.  
  
The matches are gone now, the black cardboard crumpled slightly, but Sean's still got it. And it's a good thing he has, because Jonny's not at the other bar tonight, and Sean's not sure he can wait another night to see him. He can sit at the end of the bar; he can order drinks all night and not cause trouble. Anything, so long as it means seeing Jonny again.  
  
He hopes he's not too rumpled. It would have been fine at the other place; nobody would have noticed. He's not sure anyone would notice here, either, only he feels out of place enough as he looks at the people headed for the door. Goth kids. Ten years younger than him and all in black and piercings. Sean's got the one piercing in his left ear, but nothing else; he's in jeans and a button-down shirt, dark forest green, top buttons undone and white t-shirt showing under it. Definitely out of place, and showering in the locker room at work has nothing on a good warm shower at home. He _is_ rumpled.  
  
Doesn't matter. He slips into the bar and zeroes in on the bartender, and that's all it takes. Fuck the clothes, fuck the aching back, fuck the last few days. Jonny's working tonight, and Sean's steps are lighter than they've been since he left Jonny's place last week. _God, it's fucking good to see you._  
  
Jonny's pulled nearly a double shift, starting early to cover for one of the dayside bartenders. He's tired of the girl in black -- _oh, wait, they all are_ \-- with too much makup who thinks she's Wednesday Addams coming up to ask for a Vampire's Kiss and thinking she's just uber-Goth. He grimaces, slings together the tomato juice with the alcohol and serves it up. Out of the corner of his eye, he notices someone new taking a seat at the bar's far end. The smile on his face is genuine as he looks up, sees it's Sean.  
  
 _Looks good. Great._ He doesn't even think of how out of place he might seem here. "I'll get this one, Chad," he says to his fellow nightshifter. The black long-sleeve shirt he's wearing tucked into black pants offset his tan, deeper from spending a day at the beach, mostly listening to his sister give him pseudogrief about the ring of bruises on his neck, grief tinged with jealousy, one dominatrix admiring the handiwork of another dom.  
  
"Hi," he says, pushing a cocktail napkin across the bartop, "what can I get you, Sir?"  
  
Sean's got a smile playing around the corners of his mouth as he answers. "Just whatever lager you've got on tap." _Or a date with a wall whenever you're off work._ "How are you?"  
  
"Fine," Jonny grins, not even worrying about lowering his voice over the din. "Sore as hell, but great. You?" He grabs a glass and fills it from the tap, taking extra care to get the exact level of suds, and sets it down. "Week been okay?"  
  
There'll be a better time to tell Jonny the ins and outs of the last week, Sean's sure of that. "It's better now," he says, taking the beer and giving Jonny a quick salute.  
  
"Yeah, definitely better." Jonny pushes his sleeve up, checks his watch. Couple more hours till he's off, but he could manage a break soon. "Gotta be here till 2, but I do get a few minutes here and there out from back of here."  
  
"I can wait," Sean offers. "Don't have anywhere to go tonight." And he's already wondering how closely Jonny's watched on his breaks.  
  
"Cool." There's a shout from a few folks down the bar and Jonny turns with an acknowledging wave. "Let me work a few more minutes and I'll get Chad to cover for me. It's not too insane right now."  
  
"Sounds good, yeah." Sean nods. "Don't rush for me. I'll still be here."  
  
Jonny goes down the bar, pours a couple of merlots for the upscale wannabes and gets lost making Cosmos for the gaggle of giggling girls. At one point while pouring the martinis over ice beds, he nods down the bar toward Sean and the gaggle quietens, smiling, then they're off across the room to hit on the herd of boys coming in the door. He turns, talks with Chad a few minutes and then heads back to where Sean's sitting.  
  
"You wanna refresh on that beer?" he asks, hoping the answer's no. He's got about 20 minutes and he'd like to make good use of them. "Or wanna join me on a my smoke break?"  
  
"I'll take you up on the smoke," Sean says. "Especially if you'll let me bum one. Been out a couple days now and haven't managed to get more." He's realizing, a bit to his surprise, that he's enjoying the hell out of watching Jonny work. Jonny's fast and efficient and knows what to do with his hands, how to keep everything in balance. In its own way it's got the same kind of appeal as watching his lover -- _ex_ \-- sling paint on canvas, so it's not surprising that Sean's felt as if the time was flying. Two a.m.'s not so far off, really.  
  
"Sure. C'mon." Jonny's out from behind the end of the bar and tugging at Sean's sleeve. "It's quieter in the back." _Would it be asking too much for you to burn it on me?_ he thinks but doesn't say anything. Too soon to go _that_ far with things. He's cutting a quick path through the people milling about, dancers on the edge of the floor and swings a left at the EXIT sign. Through there's the bathrooms and a smaller sitting area that's partitioned off from the main bar area by glass blocks.  
  
Sean manages to control himself enough to wait until they're actually in the bathroom. Out of sight, out of mind, and half the stalls have their doors ripped off and people with hands down each others' trousers anyway; Sean finds a clear space of wall and presses Jonny into it, thigh already parting his legs, hands trapping in his arms. "You going to think I'm a stalker if I say I missed you?" he murmurs.  
  
"No more than you thinking I'm obsessive if I say I missed you," Jonny says, not caring who hears, not caring that he's being pressed against a wall where he works. He spreads his legs, pushes up, grinding his cock into Sean's thigh. "Want it. Been thinking about it for days."  
  
"Wanted to come sooner." Sean presses in hard and then harder, growling softly at the feel of hard cock pressed up against warm muscle. "How long have you got?"  
  
"A good 20 minutes," Jonny mutters, tugging his hands against Sean's pull. "How you want it?"  
  
"Want to make you come quick and dirty. And screaming, but I can live without that for now." Sean digs his fingers into Jonny's forearms, already imagining what the pinpoint bruises are going to look like. "Want to fuck my mouth?"  
  
Jonny grins, a bit lopsided, tilting his head, biting his tongue at the bruising. "Yeah," he spits out, almost in disbelief. Expected the quick and dirty, even the screaming. Hadn't anticipated the mouth offer. "Knees, now. Come 2 a.m., you fuck me."  
  
"Perfect," Sean whispers, bending his head down and biting Jonny's shoulder through his shirt. Enough to mark, maybe, or bruise, but not enough to bleed; Jonny's still got hours of shift to get through.  
  
And then Sean's letting go of Jonny's arms, sliding his hands down to Jonny's wrists, getting to his knees on a floor that's got god-knows-what on it, and nuzzling against Jonny's fly.  
  
It _is_ perfect. Too perfect, Jonny thinks for a second, Sean sinking to the floor, Jonny looking down, moaning at the brush of cheek, nose, lips against his pants. And the bite's ache lingers, will for the hours he has till he can have Sean proper. No, _let_ Sean _have_ him. His hands work the belt undone, leave it hanging and unzip the Dockers, his cock hard just at the thought of where they are, what they're doing, and fingers brush through Sean's hair.  
  
"C'mon, then, do it. Rough. Please."  
  
"Rough," Sean breathes, warm air ghosting across the head of Jonny's cock, "don't hold back. _Fuck_ me." And he opens his mouth wide, tongue sweeping over his lips before sucking Jonny in, rough and hot and all at once, teeth scraping as Sean forces his mouth further and further, until his nose is buried in Jonny's curls and the head of Jonny's cock is hitting the back of his throat.  
  
Jonny does just that, fingers tangling in Sean's hair, jerking his head forward and sinking deep. He pulls back, slams in again, the rhythm brutal, picking up on the technobeat being played in the club. "Fuck you," he hisses, harsh, "yes, take it for me." And he shifts his angle, going up on his toes slightly so he's pulling his cock solidly against the slide of teeth, scraping relentlessly.  
  
It's been _years_ since Sean let someone take him this way. And oh, _fuck_ , it's good, so good Sean's cock hardens instantly, that he's moaning when Jonny pulls back far enough to let him. It's rough and abandoned and frantic, and Sean's hands dig into Jonny's thighs, holding on tight.  
  
"That's it," Jonny hisses, fingers clutching, pulling at the hair tangled into them. He's never been given this much leeway with anyone. Always it's been him taking, someone else giving. This is arousing in a while different way. He slams forward, thrust harsh, wanting to choke Sean, consciously push beyond whatever limit exists in the instant before he comes.  
  
If there are limits between them, Sean doesn't know what they could be. He's not going to try to put any on Jonny, not on what he'll give, not on what he can take. Just slamming his mouth over Jonny's cock, sucking so hard it's already making his jaw ache, letting Jonny fuck him -- _demanding_ Jonny fuck him 'til he can't speak, 'til his throat's raw and bruised from it.  
  
The music changes from the techno to an '80s punk, just enough of a switch in Jonny's brain to trigger him. He comes, gripping Sean's head, fingers knot-sliding through the hair to anchor at the back, splay down to Sean's neck, hold him hard and steady against the flood. "Oh, fuck, yes," he slurs out, "Christ, that's good."  
  
It is good. It's so good Sean can't swallow yet, knows when he will it'll hurt like hell. His eyes are shut, finally, scalp stinging against the pull in his hair, cock so hard he's leaking, probably already has a stain at the front of his jeans. Fuck, it's _incredible_.  
  
Jonny waits until his body stops shaking to even consider pulling back, and then it's with a sharp tug of Sean's head. "Fuck, you're good," he blurts out, staring down as Sean's mouth slips off his cock, smiling insanely.  
  
Sean would agree, would thank Jonny for the compliment, but his throat hurts and all that comes out is a soft croak. Fuck it; he gets up off his knees and slams Jonny back into the wall, mouth crushed to Jonny's, tongue shoving in deep and sharing Jonny's come with him. _Hell, yes, it was fucking good._  
  
The kiss is good, that last drag off the cigarette before you get out of the car good, and Jonny's tasting himself in a new way, off a lover's lips. _Delicious. Sinful._ Back shoved into the wall, all the muscles that were aching after Sean'd fucked him days ago renew their throbs, anticipation of later. "You, man," he mutters, kiss broken in random sucks at bottom lips, "wanna get off now?"  
  
Sean pulls back, grin spread from ear to ear and cock so hard it's drilling into Jonny's thigh. "Want to--" _Christ_ , his voice is so roughened it's like listening to speech drawn through gravel. "Want to watch you at the bar and ache for it 'til I can get you alone," he whispers.  
  
"Oh, fuck, that's hot." Jonny leans his head back against the wall, Sean's voice washing through him, shivering his spine. "Gonna be hard again just knowing you're watching like that."  
  
"Good," Sean whispers, nuzzling Jonny's neck, making his way to Jonny's earlobe and biting down hard. "Want you thinking about how I'm going to hurt you when we're back at your place." He realizes afterwards that he's just invited himself home; he pulls back enough to get a look at Jonny's face. "If it's all right," he says softly. "If you don't mind bringing me home again."  
  
"I don't mind." _Hell, move the fuck in. Want this every day._ Jonny clutches at Sean's waist, digging his nails in through the shirt. "Would be upset if you didn't come home with me," he drops his voice low, "beat me till I can't think of walking. Don't work tomorrow."  
  
"Christ," Sean whispers. "Fuck, that sounds good." And if there's a voice in the back of his head wondering if this is too good to be real, he's damned well going to ignore it.  
  
Jonny's internal clock is ticking down the minutes of his break. "Gotta get back," he sighs, hands leaving Sean's body to readjust himself, tuck in shirt, straighten belt. "Chad's a sweetheart, but his patience doesn't extend beyond 20 minutes."  
  
"Hope it extends to letting you get a blowjob in the back." Sean grins, pushing back and sliding a hand down the front of his jeans to adjust himself. "Fuck, was that good... going to be remembering the taste of you all night."  
  
~.~.~.~.~.  
  
Everything's fine for a few hours, Jonny occasionally sliding to the end of the bar, refreshing Sean's beer, snagging a minute of conversation, and then about 1 a.m. he starts getting antsy. Doesn't help, or hurt for that matter, that Sean's grin has gotten downright feral and Jonny's bordering on being knife-edge hard again just thinking about what happens in, he glances at the clock, 34 minutes. "You want anything else to drink?" he asks, leaning over the bar, the crowd having dissipated enough to allow him a few minutes' respite. "If not, I can coerce Chad into covering for me, slipping out early."  
  
"Let me think, another beer or getting you all to myself thirty-three minutes ahead of schedule," Sean half-purrs, leaning forward in return. "See if you can get out of here early. I think I've had enough."  
  
"Sure thing, sir," Jonny quips, resisting the urge to lean over more, kiss his new lover. He's not quite ready for that level of PDA.  
  
Instead, he turns and sidles up behind Chad, his hands resting lightly on Chad's hips and his chin on the other bartender's shoulder. He nods back toward Sean and they're both smiling. A minute, two, then Jonny's back down the bar. "Okay, I'm yours."  
  
The easy affection between Jonny and his friend has Sean grinning, thinking about the smile on Jonny's face, the look he got from both men. "Mine," Sean says softly, rolling the sound over his tongue --the first time he's done it deliberately -- and he nods, sliding off his bar stool. "Did you drive here or do you need a ride?"  
  
"Need the ride tonight. Car's in the shop. Engine needed a bit o'tinkering and I suck at being a mechanic." Jonny's out from behind the bar, standing next to Sean. "Promise not to harass the driver too much."  
  
"Promise not to be too disappointed with the lack of harassment," Sean teases back. "Come on, out this way." He nudges Jonny with his shoulder, slips both hands into his pockets so he won't be too tempted to grab, press into a wall, pin to the hood of his car. It can wait 'til they're home.  
  
Easy walk to the car. Hands in check. _Damn._ And into the car, even. Jonny's being patient, trying not to squirm like a sugar-rushed junkie. "Bought a couple things yesterday," he says quietly as the car engine hums. "Not that you have to use 'em, but just in case you're interested," he continues, even-toned, "flogger and paddle and," he grins, "really wicked-looking dildo. Couple other things."  
  
"Christ," Sean explodes, almost running the car off the road instead of easing them gently into traffic. "Christ, now there's an invitation. I haven't -- I don't--" _You're not in the car with someone who's going to want to know why the hell you want to do something that hurts people. So stop._ "I'm out of practice," he settles for, finally. And then, curiosity overcoming him, "Other things?"  
  
"Sorry. That might've constituted harassment." Jonny's grinning as Sean straightens out the car, manages _not_ to hit anyone. "And a big assumption on my part, that you'd want to play that way." He pauses, cheeks reddening slightly at thinking of what all he bought. "Uhm, plug and clamps and, it's weird, never bought stuff before. It was kinda fun, in a weird way."  
  
"I knew a guy," _a few guys_ , "who was into that, back home, but haven't done anything with it since I got here. I'd have gone shopping with you." He grins. "You can assume if you want."  
  
"Next time," Jonny shrugs. "And it's not that I want you to stop what you're doing. Christ, no. Fuck, love your hands hurting me. Just, well, thought, it'd be something new. Just to try."  
  
"How do you feel about being tied down?" Sean asks, thinking about just how good Jonny's wrists would look bound up in leather.  
  
"Never tried it. I like being _held_ down. Can't imagine it's a lot different."  
  
Sean thinks they can improvise. Belts. Scarves, maybe, something. He wonders if the all-night adult bookstore he's gone to on occasion would carry cuffs, decent cuffs, if he should even be thinking about splurging on them at random. Hell. Next time. There's a lot on tap for next time. "It feels different on my end," Sean says, grinning. "Next time. Fuck, I want to get you home."  
  
Jonny laughs at the sense of urgency in Sean's voice, the promise of _next time_ when _this_ time's not even over. "Then don't miss the turn, Sean. It's the next left."  
  
"I remember," Sean says, flashing Jonny another smile. He's made the turns so far; he remembers driving there, driving home in the early morning hours. "I didn't get you into trouble last time?"  
  
"No, no trouble," Jonny says, sitting back into the seat, "not more than a couple people curious as hell about my new friend."  
  
Sean makes that left turn and keeps going, glad they're almost there. "Telling people anything?" he asks.  
  
"Not much, 'cept Sissy and Chad, but they know everything 'bout me. Didn't call you my boyfriend or anything, just so's you know."  
  
 _Boyfriend._ Sean almost chokes, but then he's pulling into the driveway and thinking it might be better to let that one go. "I don't have to be anywhere in the morning," he says quietly, "work, but not 'til nine. I've got clothes in the back if you'll lend me your shower in the morning." He's got more than clothes; he's got pillows and blankets and nothing folded particularly neatly. But he's slept in worse, and the car's free.  
  
"Sure. Stay the night." _The week. The month._ "Any night you want, it's cool." Jonny manages to wait till the car's stopped to open the door, thinking it's too soon to offer him up a key. Then he smiles, half out of the car. "Want me over the hood? Or can we make it all the way upstairs first?"  
  
"I think we can make it upstairs this time." Sean slips out of the car too, walks around to Jonny's side. "Think if I'm going to burn you again, I want to do it closer up."  
  
Jonny's halfway up the stairs when the sentence hits him. "Burn me?" he asks, turning around, moving up the familiar steps nearly backwards. "Don't wanna know I got a kink for that no one's touched, do ya?"  
  
Sean's following Jonny up the stairs almost close enough to end up stepping on him. And his mouth's gone dry. "You'd let me," he says softly. Not quite a question. Things are quickly moving out of question territory, into foregone conclusion, and that's as exciting as it is scary.  
  
There's not really an answer for something that's not quite a question. Jonny just nods as he unlocks the door, pushes it open. He'd let him. What, a week he's known him, and he's willing to give him everything. Something about innate trust. He tosses his keys on the table and runs his hand through his hair, musing that it's a bit shaggy and needs a cut.  
  
It's familiar, being back here. It amazes Sean, how it feels to have a familiar place with a guy he's known for so little time. And it's making him flash back on how it felt meeting his lover -- _ex_ \--and that brings him to something that he thinks he needs to get out sooner rather than later. "Listen..." He catches Jonny's arm, tugs him close; it's always easier letting out rough news when he's touching someone, god knows why. "Listen, there's something I need to tell you about the last week."  
  
"What about last week?" Jonny thinks on what they did last week, what could've gone wrong. He half-smiles, waiting on the other shoe to drop.  
  
"The man I've been living with--" Sean sighs, lets Jonny go and shoves his hands back into his pockets. "I'm not with him anymore. He kicked me out. And I don't want you to think I'm here because I have nowhere else to go."  
  
"Don't think that," Jonny says quickly, wanting to reach out and touch, grab the hands from those jeans pockets and put them back on his body, resisting the urge. "Told you before, you can stay here much as you want." He pauses. "Was it because of me? Breaking up."  
  
Sean shakes his head, looking down at the floor. "It's been bad for a while now," he says quietly, "this was just the last of it. It was going to happen eventually. Wasn't only you."  
  
"Then don't sweat it." Jonny shrugs, waits a few minutes in the silence, does finally reach out, touch Sean's arm. "Fuck me? Hurt me? For as long as you find it interesting."  
  
"Christ, you don't know what it's like for me," Sean says, reaching out in return, sliding his hand up Jonny's arm and curling his fingers around his shoulder. "I've been told so many times that it isn't _done_ the way we do it, that if I were a decent human being it wouldn't even occur to me to get off on hurting people, and Christ, then I meet you and it's everything I've needed for so long and--" He stops, bites his lower lip, sure he's saying too much again.  
  
"It's okay, Sean. Really." Jonny smiles at the touch. "Dad put me in therapy when he found out I liked boys, then threatened to have me committed when I started getting myself hurt. Luckily, he just kicked me out. It's who we are, what we like. Nothing wrong with it."  
  
Sean brings his other hand up, cups Jonny's face in both his hands. There aren't enough words for what he's feeling right now. _Accepted_ 's the best one that comes to mind, and he kisses Jonny hard, hard enough to bruise lips, tearing into him the way that feels natural, that's always felt so goddamned right, the kind of kiss that's had other men dragging back and saying _hey, easy_.  
  
This _is_ easy, at least in Jonny's mind, the bruising just on the edge of where he wants to tread. He touches Sean full-on now, hands going to his waist, tugging at the shirt still tucked into pants, clamoring for flesh to fondle.  
  
"Please," Sean gasps, " _now_ , can't wait anymore..." He grabs Jonny's wrists and backs his way towards the bed, dragging Jonny with him.  
  
Jonny's pushing Sean onto the bed when they reach its edge, crawling up over him. "Want you naked," he says, shoving shirt up Sean's chest, following it with tongue, licking over stomach and abs. "Nothing between us when you start. Just flesh, skin to be marked."  
  
"Yes," Sean breathes, almost frantic as he gets the buttons undone, tears the shirt off and throws it over the side of the bed. Undershirt, too; he can't get undressed fast enough. He digs his fingers into Jonny's hair, twisting, tugging, forcing Jonny's mouth up his chest, over a nipple. "Bite," he whispers.  
  
"Yessir." Jonny licks first, slathers the nipple with saliva, then bites, tugging the nub up between his teeth.  
  
" _Ahh--_ God, that's good," Sean gasps, tightening his grip in Jonny's hair. "Christ, you're so good, want you so much, never felt this way before, _harder_..."  
  
Obliging his lover, Jonny bites harder. Again. And once more after that. Nearly drawing blood. Definitely bruising, turning the flesh around the nipple bright red that'll morph to purple, leaving teeth marks that'll be there when morning comes. No one's ever asked for this. No one's ever held his head so tightly. He tugs, not against it but with it, begging for the fingers to snare and tangle him. "More?" he licks over the abused nipple, moves his head toward its neglected companion.  
  
"Christ, yes, more," Sean moans, digging his fingers even harder into Jonny's hair. "Bruise me. Hurt me. God, I can't wait to get my teeth on you again."  
  
"Oh, fuck, yeah," Jonny moans, biting down hard, on the first try, twisting his head in Sean's grip, nearly slicing through the flesh under his teeth, tasting the hint of copper on his tongue. He's hard, cock pushing against trousers zipper, and he grinds down into Sean's leg. "Want you," he hisses.  
  
"Then roll over," Sean growls, finally tugging Jonny's head away from his chest. "Roll over and let me fuck you through the mattress."  
  
"Hell, yes." There's no need for the second _roll over_ as Jonny's off Sean as the growl crescendoes, rolling over onto his back, hands working to squirm himself out of his trousers.  
  
Sean's shoving out of the rest of his clothes as fast as he can, too, leaving them puddled at the side of the bed and coming up to push Jonny's knees up, bending him nearly in half. Lube. He really ought to be thinking of lube, but he doesn't want to wait and he's starting to trust that Jonny wants it as hard as he does. So it's just spit, just a thin coat of it over his cock, and he's pressing the head of his cock against Jonny's arse, shoving in that first inch before he has to stop, groaning.  
  
"Fuckhelldamnshit," Jonny spits out the expletives as Sean pushes in. No lube. Damned hard. Blessedly painful. He pants out the breaths, willing himself to relax, push back slowly, open himself more. "Don't. Stop. S'okay."  
  
"Christ, I love your mouth." Sean laughs, pushes in another inch. " _Fuck_. So tight. God, it should always be like this." He groans, keeps forcing Jonny open, tearing into him, splitting him apart. "Christ, yes. _Mine._ "  
  
"Like my mouth, do ya? Then I'll just keep --" Jonny's thought is abruptly interrupted when Sean pushes those hardest inches, right in the middle of the shove inward. "Oh, fuck, hard to talk when you're ripping into me. So good."  
  
Sean lets Jonny's knees go, reaches up to pin his arms down. "Come on. Open up for me. You've had me before. You can take it." He grits his teeth, shoves in the last inch and rests there, panting, bruising his fingerprints into Jonny's wrists.  
  
Jonny does open, stretching his legs out, wrapping them around Sean's waist, heels banging at his back. "Yeah. Had it. Take it. Harder, Sean. Push more."  
  
"More," Sean growls. _Always more with you._ And there's more to give. More until he's aching. More until he's burned up with it, 'til they both are, 'til Jonny's bleeding and screaming and fighting him. Just _more_ , Christ, pounding into him as hard as he can.  
  
 _More_ may be too much, Jonny thinks for a half-second, his body feeling like it's split in two. He pant-breathes, ragged and hard, hands tugging against Sean's grip, legs clenching his lover's body. "There. Yeah. Right. There."  
  
"Want. Need. Fuck," Sean rasps out, leaning down to bite at Jonny's lips. "So good. So fucking good. Want this. Just like this. _Yes._ "  
  
"You. Want. Need." Jonny breathes out, kisses Sean's lips. "Let me. Please."  
  
Kissing back hard, Sean shifts his grip on Jonny's arms 'til he's holding Jonny's wrists in one hand. His other hand slides between them, wraps around Jonny's cock and starts jerking him off hard. "Come for me," he growls.  
  
With a keening moan, Jonny comes into Sean's hand, too fast, like a teenager, eager and ready before he's even had the fun. But he's _having_ fun, aching and bruising everywhere, and wanting more by the minute.  
  
And Sean's following him right over, panting and gasping and coming with a last solid thrust, so fucking glad to be here that the only thing he can do as he catches his breath is grin.


	4. Never Bring Home Strays

Sean wakes up somewhere in the middle of the night, tangled up in sheets that feel damp in places, curled around a body that's smaller than what he's used to, not slighter exactly, just different. _Who...?_ And he realizes, as he blinks himself awake: _Jonny._

He curls up tighter, tucking his face into the back of Jonny's neck. He wonders for a faint moment if he's been overstaying his welcome; if a rough fuck or two, or three, is one thing, and staying the night -- staying the night more than once -- is something else. He's gotten into trouble before, assuming there was something worth staying for when it was mostly good sex and...

_And being lonely,_ he thinks to himself, but he keeps his arms tight around Jonny all the same.

Jonny sleeps hard, usually out in minutes and not awake till the blasted alarm's been snoozed three times. But he usually sleeps alone and rolling over in the bed isn't a major undertaking. It certainly doesn't put him in direct contact with another body. Usually.

He moans at the slinking of arm around his waist, rolling back against the body next to him. _Sean,_ he processes after a minute, and then he's turning over, wanting to face his new lover, hoping it's not too forward a move, too demanding. _Fuck it, Miller, don't scare him off._

"Hey," Sean says softly, moving back to give Jonny enough time to roll over, "didn't mean to wake you."

"Huh?" Jonny's slow to open his eyes, and he's snuggling into the warmth Sean's radiating. "S'okay. What time is it?"

"Don't know..." Sean squints at the alarm clock, trying to get a reading. "Maybe five," he murmurs. "Been sleeping all right?" He brushes the hair off Jonny's forehead, letting his thumb rub over his temple.

"Yeah." Words are as simple as Jonny can make them, his tongue not hitting the right spots in forming syllables. "Sleep hard. All night."

Sean grins, ear-to-ear, unguarded for a moment as he leans in and kisses the top of Jonny's head. There's something about this that has him feeling protective, not he's surprised. "I have to be up in another three hours for work," he says, wishing there were an easier way to ask _do you want me gone by the time you wake up?_

"Then roll back onto me and sleep more." Jonny's a second-shifter and doesn't have to be up till middle of the day. Today, he doesn't have to be up at all since he's not working. "Or you can fuck me," he slurs into the pillows. He's not guaranteeing any response, though, as he's not the morning person.

Sean's got no set plan to do either -- sleep more or make a move for sex -- but rolling over on Jonny sounds good either way, so he does just that, rolls up and slides an arm around Jonny's shoulders. Asking questions like _can I come back?_ needs to be done when both people are awake; he's not going to get into something that complicated now. This is comfortable. Easy. It feels like it's supposed to feel, and Sean's tired of overthinking.

"A little more sleep," he murmurs. "Fuck you later tonight. Promise."

"That's cool." The words are squished out of Jonny's lungs by Sean's shifting. "Later. Tonight. When you come home," Jonny murmurs, not thinking on the words, just letting them out.

_It could be,_ Sean thinks. He gives Jonny's shoulder a lick -- right over one of his bruises -- and nuzzles in, willing to let the rest of the questions and answers -- or non-answers -- go for now.

Jonny sinks back into sleep, warm body wrapping him turning hotter as he falls deeper. The sleep's nearly of the dead, heavy and surreal dreamstate. He doesn't want to wake up, suspecting Sean won't be there when he does, and sleep delays the inevitability of reality. _He's not gonna be around forever._

~*~

Sean's been lying perfectly still for nearly twenty minutes now, not wanting to get up. He's been watching Jonny sleep, justifying another five minutes in bed, and then another five after that, and another five after that. But he's only got an hour left before work now, and he nuzzles into the side of Jonny's neck, nipping softly.

The nuzzling evokes a response, Jonny curling his shoulder up against his neck. The nip gets more, a soft whimper and a half-awake slur. "You're still here. Time. Work." Jonny does _not_ do mornings. Instead he curls more tightly against Sean, twisting and turning enough to get his leg over his lover's, twine them. "Awake," he mutters. "Barely."

"I can make coffee," Sean whispers, slipping between Jonny's legs, settling on top of him. "I should get up."

"Coffee," Jonny echoes, settling under Sean's weight, comforted by the press of flesh against his. "You have to go?"

"Don't want to," Sean admits, pressing his lips to Jonny's forehead, the tip of his nose, his chin. "But I've got work."

"Work. Hmm. Yeah." Jonny's waking slowly, the kisses a nice way to be roused from sleep. He scoots back into the pillow, blinks open his eyes, stares at Sean. "There you are. Knew you were here." He smiles. "What time you finish?"

"Five," Sean says, "more or less." He presses up on his elbows, looks down at Jonny in the dim morning light. This is _not_ a man who looks like he wants to be rid of him. Sean's heart twists up; it's an unexpected feeling. "Want dinner when I'm through?"

"Dinner. Yeah. Want me to cook?" Jonny's thinking it saves time on what'll come _after_ dinner.

"Can you?" Sean asks, flashing Jonny a grin. "I'm completely hopeless. You'd either starve or live on takeout if it's up to me."

Jonny laughs, fully awake now, shifting to put his arms around Sean's neck. "Yeah, I cook. Not like you're eating at Spago every night, but I manage not to kill myself."

"Mmm. That'll do fine for me." Sean bends down, licks over a bruise on Jonny's neck, sinks his teeth into it and darkens it a little more.

The laugh collapses into a moan. "Fuck, you really _have_ to leave?" Jonny nudges Sean's body with a squirm. "Shit. How long before you risk being late?"

"Adding up shower, the drive, coffee -- twenty minutes," Sean answers, slipping a hand between them and wrapping it around both their cocks, pressing them together and giving them a nice long stroke.

"Gimme fifteen, then," Jonny mutters, licking his lips, arching up at the touch of fingers on his cock. "Get me off and promise I'll be hard when you get back. Please."

"You think I could go to work hard, thinking about you, thinking about how good it's going to feel coming--" _home_ "--back and bending you over the counter?" Sean's strokes are starting to pick up a little more speed now, a little more intent, offer accepted and body demanding release. "Need this or I'll be out of my mind when I'm supposed to be working spreadsheets. All damned day."

"Don't want that. No. Can't have you wanting to jerk off over the spreadsheets, sir." Jonny's voice harbors a small laugh that's quickly coated with moans and incessant need. "Forget the fifteen. You got about five. Oh, fuck, you're good at that."

"I have," Sean teases, licking his way over the mapwork of marks left on Jonny's shoulders, "a _lot_... of practice." He bites down hard as his hand sweeps over the head of Jonny's cock, growls softly and presses his hips down hard.

"Oh, fuck, gonna come. Don't want to, but gonna." Jonny's shifting, pushing up as much as he can against Sean's mouth. _Fuckin' teenager, Miller. Like he's gonna keep being impressed with this._

"C'mon, yes, get it all over my hand, let me rub your come all over my cock and stroke myself off with it--" Sean growls, teeth sink into Jonny's shoulder, break skin, draw blood, and the taste of it under his tongue is almost enough to send him over then and there.

The bite does send Jonny over and he's coming in small spurts, almost painful, white streaking Sean's fingers as Jonny's free hand clutches at his lover's body, fingers digging into whatever flesh they can find. "Fuck. Yeah."

Sean's going to feel those fingernail crescents in his arm all day long; he's going to have something from Jonny to keep him sane all day at work. "Christ, _fuck_ ," and words are merciful and fail him for the rest. His cock's jerking against Jonny's, hand's tightening around both cocks, and he lets out gasp after gasp as he comes all over his lover, streaks messy and sticky and staining both their stomachs.

Jonny doesn't say anything for a few minutes, then he's slowly breathing, relaxing into the bed. There are a million words floating in his brain, none of which sound good enough to say, most of which aren't quite right. "Shower," he finally settles on. "You first."

"Don't want to," Sean mutters, collapsing on Jonny and using his free arm to squeeze him close. "Want another half-hour sleep and want to fuck again."

"Can't," Jonny rasps as the air's knocked out of him. "You gotta go to work. You can fuck me the minute you come home."

"Not fair," Sean mumbles. "Want to have us both coming so much you're sticky all over with it. Stained. Filthy. Not enough. Can't get enough with you. Want to stay."

"Stay then. Tonight. Tomorrow night. Next week." Jonny kisses Sean's cheek, lips, sucks at them. "Want you here." Breathes out the relief that he can _say_ the words. "But you need a job. And you're gonna be late. So, up. Now."

"Yessir," Sean smirks, finally sliding up and away from Jonny, untangling himself from the sheets. "Don't suppose there's room in your shower for two?"

Jonny points to the alarm clock, their fifteen minutes dwindling quickly. "Not and you get to work," he says, pulling himself up from the bed, stretching. "Unless you can shower without touching me."

"Not a chance," Sean says seriously, and he takes off for the shower, sticky and grinning and exhausted.

~*~

It wasn't the longest day Sean's ever spent at work. Wasn't the shortest, either, and he curses every red light on the way back to Jonny's. His thoughts have been going back and forth between _we need to talk_ and _just want to keep this, this way, don't want to fuck it up with talking_ for the whole drive; he's more than a little nervous. But damn, it felt good sleeping in a bed, sleeping tangled up with someone last night. It felt fucking amazing.

Jonny's spent the day, once he had Sean up and out, running errands, getting everything for dinner, which meant restocking the kitchen, making sure there's coffee for the morning, snacks for late-night munchies and beer. Good beer. He's got the steaks on the grill, one of those George Foreman deals that sits on the counter, and the potatoes are in the oven baking. He's in jeans, the ones he thinks hang too low on his hips but Chad keeps telling him to wear more often, cock damned hard, having been worked to the edge during the day's second shower, and the tails of the faded concert t-shirt barely meet the waistband.

Sean doesn't have a key, wouldn't be ready to let himself in even if he did. He knocks at Jonny's door, shoving both hands into his pockets and rocking back onto his heels, nervous. They keep reconnecting on normal levels, nowhere near where they were that first night at the bar, and what's strange about that is how much he wants it. How much he wants those normal levels.

Turning down the grill a notch, Jonny leaves the kitchen and answers the door. "You could've just come on in," he says, smiling, stepping back. "S'not locked."

"Didn't want to assume too much," Sean says, not letting Jonny step back too far. He wants the hug, the contact, the _how have you been, I missed you_ greeting that marks the start of an evening. "Was distracted all day long because of you. How was your day?"

Jonny's stepping back only far enough to let Sean move into the room and then shut the door. Then he's on him, almost a pounce, wrapping arms around Sean's neck and kissing him soundly. "Boring. Grocery shopping. Puttering around. Glad you're home."

_Home._ Sean wraps arms around Jonny's waist and kisses him back. "How often do you do this?" he asks softly. "Bring home strays, I mean."

"Huh?" The question startles Jonny. "Never. Haven't ever done this." He frowns. "You were thinking I do this kind of thing all the time?"

Sean shakes his head, pulling back. "No, didn't mean that. It's only that it's been so easy so far. Wondered if you'd been thinking about that. About how smart it is opening your home up to someone you've only known a week or two, and barely out of bed for that."

"Oh, that." Jonny shrugs. "Sissy says I'm fatalistic. I suppose I am, the way I let guys beat up on me. If you're some serial psycho, then at least I got a couple weeks of fuckin' great sex out of it."

"This is as psychopathic as I get," Sean says, mouth twisting. "You don't have to worry about it getting worse. There's the advantage of meeting someone who's down as low as he's been in a while."

"Then it's probably kinda sick for me to say I _like_ your version of psychopathic." Jonny's tugging at Sean's shirt, bunching it in his fingers. "Dinner's ready if you want, but it's nothing that can't keep cooking for a bit longer, if there's something else you want."

_I want to stay here, with you. I want to keep feeling this way, like what I want's all right, like wanting it this way doesn't make me sick and twisted, like you could take anything I have to give._ "Want a lot of things." Sean grins. "I'm starved. Feed me first and I promise I'll tear the shite out of you after."

"Awright," Jonny blurts out, a bit too eager, blushing as he steps back. "You sit down. I'll get everything."

Sean has a seat, relaxes and undoes the top buttons of his shirt as Jonny brings over dinner. It's good, _damned_ good in comparison to the fast food he's been surviving off since getting kicked out of his lover's house. But he's a hell of a lot more interested in what happens after dinner.

"It's just steak, salad," Jonny says, bringing everything to the table, taking a seat opposite. "I restocked the kitchen though, and there's other stuff, munchies for late-night, other stuff if you'd rather." He's hungry, hasn't eaten all day, too nervous about whether Sean might not come back, that it might all have been an incredible dream. "More beer, too."

And it hits Sean all at once: Jonny's as nervous as he is. This isn't routine for either of them. And they're both afraid of fucking it up.

"It's good," Sean says, "it's _all_ good, God, Jonny, it's more than I was expecting." And he doesn't just mean the food.

Jonny picks at his food, cutting the steak into bites much smaller than he needs. "Can I ask something?" he asks, not looking up.

"Yeah." Sean sets knife and fork down and forces himself not to fidget. "You can ask me anything."

"What were you expecting?" The words come out slowly. "Are expecting? This is all sort of new on this end."

Sean finds himself wishing for a cigarette; he props his chin up on his hand, elbow resting on the table, and exhales softly. "I've not been expecting anything," he says. "Didn't expect to meet you, didn't expect to see you again, never expected you to be willing to take me home."

"Expect to want it?" Jonny takes a bite of the salad, then the steak. "I know I didn't. Not like this. Wanting you to stay." His voice drops to a whisper. "It's scary."

"Christ, it's very fucking scary," Sean agrees, voice just as low. "And I -- maybe I did expect to want more. It's -- I've never been with someone who wanted everything. And then came back and wanted it again. And then again after that, and Christ, yeah, scary," _because what happens when you get sick of me?_

"I'm not wanting too much, am I? I mean, before, it's just been the hard fucks against whatever wall was handy." _And yesterday you went shopping for sex toys._ Jonny forks his food, plays with it before eating another few bites. "I want everything you can give me. Want to try it all."

"Want to see how far this goes," Sean says quietly. "Not expecting anything. Just... it's so different, knowing I'm not scaring you. That I don't have to lie to you about anything. I keep waiting for the catch."

"What catch? You're not gonna scare me." Jonny glances up, smiles. "Least, I don't think so. Or not such that I'd want you to leave."

"I don't want to leave," Sean blurts out. He shakes his head at himself, wincing. "Maybe that's more than you wanted to hear. I don't want to go. Feel as if there's a hell of a lot more to look for and I don't want to waste the chance."

Jonny lets out a breath, one he'd forgotten he was holding. "Don't want you to leave. That's the scariest part. Want you to stay, be here when I come home at night, so I can wake you up, beg to be fucked." He blushes, just at the thought of kneeling beside the bed at 2 a.m., hard and whimpering pleas against Sean's ear.

Sean slides out of his chair, comes around behind Jonny and wraps both arms around his shoulders. "Christ. Want that, too." He turns his head, bites down hard on Jonny's earlobe. "I'm distracted. And you went to all this trouble for dinner."

"Dinner'll keep. Steak's good cold." Jonny mutters the words out between moans. "Would much rather hurt for you now," he says, licking his lips. "Please, sir."

"Now," Sean breathes, "come on, boy, bed." He's only willing to let Jonny go in order to let him stand up; his trousers are already getting tight, and he wants Jonny in bed. _Now._

He stands up, ignoring the random tug in the back of his brain to slide out of the chair to his knees instead. They're not there. Yet. He walks toward the bed, turning at the last moment. "How you want me? Face up? Down?" He can't believe he's asking these questions so casually. "Strip first?"

"Strip off," Sean says, "and I want you kneeling at the foot of the bed. You bought things -- do you want to be hurt with something apart from my hands tonight?"

Skimming the T-shirt off over his head, Jonny thinks on the question. Sean's hands alone are enough to drive him insane, but he's curious. He'll admit that. "Yes, sir. Whatever you think I'd like. Don't know much about pain other than from hands."

Sean runs a fingertip down the center of Jonny's chest, tucking it into his waistband and then tugging him forward hard. "Show me what you bought," he breathes. "I want to see what my options are. Think about all the ways I can make your skin red and hot and welted."

Jonny wonders just how hard a man can get before he explodes, 'cause he's sure he's well on his way to it. "In, um, top drawer," he breathes out. "Red and welted? Sounds good. Uh, got a flogger. And a crop. I know of those, at least."

"Get these off." Sean gives one last tug to Jonny's waistband and heads for the chest of drawers, opening the top drawer. _Flogger. Crop._ He gets the flogger out; he's used floggers, at least. Never touched a crop, but he can imagine the marks on Jonny's skin already.

The flogger's medium-heavy, black tails, suede. Sean's trying to imagine Jonny going out for this, buying it thinking about Sean using it on him, and _God_ \-- it's so much. Just so much to be offered. His chest twists up hard enough he can barely breathe, and he heads back for Jonny, sliding his hand down Jonny's back.

The jeans are off in record time, tossed to the side, toward the bathroom door, and then Jonny's kneeling at the foot of the bed. He doesn't know a thing about how he's supposed to kneel, so here's just there, sort of sitting back on his heels, hands fidgeting with his thighs. And he's watching Sean finger the leather. _Oh, fuck, yeah._ Then the hand's on his back and he straightens against it, instinct kicking in.

Sean drapes the tails over Jonny's shoulder and drags them up and over, down the length of his back. "Kneel up a little more," he murmurs, "with your forearms on the foot of the bed."

"Okay," Jonny mutters, moving forward on his knees, laying his arms down on the bed. He looks over his shoulder. "You want I should call you 'sir' all the time while we're doing this?"

"Only if you want to." Sean drags the tails down Jonny's back again, from shoulder to hip and over the curve of his arse. _Christ_ but his cock's aching, and he slides a hand down the front of his trousers to adjust himself; he comes away with a smear of precome on his palm, and licks it off slowly.

There's no way _not_ to shiver, despite the room being warm and Jonny's body on fire from within. The touch of leather's unfamiliar, but instantly arousing, and his cock's hard, jutting against the bed's edge. "That feels," he pauses, licking his too-dry lips, "good. Damned good. Sir."

"Oh, Christ, you look so good like this," Sean murmurs. "Starting you out slow, now. If anything feels wrong, tell me." And he brings the tails down nice and easy against Jonny's arse.

Jonny flinches, his body jerking slightly. It's not the sting of hand. It's a subtle sting, one that lingers. _If anything feels wrong? How's it supposed to feel?_

Another strike, and another, and Sean's body finds the rhythm easily. It's been so long since he's done this, but he's wanted to, stroked off to thinking about it, watched from the backs of bars and thought about what it would be like having leather in his hands again.

As the strikes continue, Jonny shifts, stretching his arms out across the bed, pressing his head down between them, finding the right position, the one that lets the leather hit harder. He's never wanted it like this, and as Sean continues, the rhythm falling against his ass, Jonny can't imagine why. It's wonderful.

Harder. Harder. Harder than _that_ , pushing Jonny into a place where his skin's going red and Sean can see every strike he makes blending into the last. He's moving down, taking in the tops of Jonny's thighs, not thinking about whether it'll be hard for him to walk afterwards, just needing to see marks all over him, red and purple and made by _him_.

Harder's good. Pain's good. To a point. When the leather kisses his thighs. Jonny grimaces, the pain fresh and suddenly, momentarily, too intense. He clutches the blanket, bunching it up under his fingers, bracing against the pain, pushing back into it, trying to ride it out. It's not really any worse than he's taken from fists and fingers, but it's _so_ different, burning and cutting through his body.

He could stop. Sean knows he could stop, knows Jonny's not going to ask him to, that even if Sean had gone through the speech about safewords he wouldn't be hearing one. And he knows what the tightening of those hands means, the look on Jonny's face, but Christ, it's not enough yet. And he keeps going, lashing out at the same spot, red mottling and going purple under leather tails.

Jonny doesn't know how to stop Sean. The word _stop_ wouldn't come out of his mouth if he wanted. And he doesn't want it to stop. Wants to hurt so badly he has to beg Chad to cover his shift the next night. "Oh, fuck, Sean," he mutters into the blanket, nearly biting it as the burning increases, spreads. He'd swear someone'd taken a match to his flesh. "Hurts. Damned. Good."

All that and Sean hasn't even made his way up to Jonny's shoulders. He gives Jonny's arse one last hard smack with the tails and then goes up, a hard fast rhythm across Jonny's back, no warmup, no easing his way into it, just pain, rough and hard and solid.

He doesn't even try to process the new sensations, just letting them sluice into the fire already searing his flesh, cutting a clear path to his brain. Later, he'll analyze, dissect, catalogue. Now it's just about the pain and stretching onto the blanket, opening his body up to Sean's handiwork.

Sean stops before Jonny's shoulders are the same dark shade of red as his arse and thighs. It's not about thinking Jonny can't take it; he's just ready to stop then, and he's leaking precome and wanting to fuck Jonny so hard they're both screaming from it. He drops the flogger to the bed's surface and kneels down behind Jonny, scratching his nails down Jonny's shoulders, down his back, over his arse and thighs.

The first instinct is to cry out, beg for it not to stop when the lashing ceases. And Jonny opens his mouth to get that out, just as Sean's nails bite into already red, oversensitized flesh. "Aw, fuck, hell, yes," he pants out, the cutting pain overlaying everything else. His mind's floating on the adrenaline rush, endorphins leveling out everything to an intense throb.

" _Yes_ ," Sean hisses, bending forward and biting hard at Jonny's shoulder. _Not enough._ As if anything could be enough; he's not sure he could find _enough_ at this point even if he were looking for it.

"Please." The word's stilted by the bite, torn off and garbled. Jonny pants out a few breaths. "Fuck. Please. Want you inside me."

Sean slaps Jonny's arse hard, feeling the sting of it against his palm. "How much do you want it?" he asks, standing up and starting to strip out of his clothes.

"Bad. Badly. Worse than that." Jonny's command of the English language, allegedly his native tongue, is somewhat lacking at the moment. "So bad I'd crawl through broken beer bottles."

_Christ,_ and Sean doesn't see how he could ever get tired of hearing Jonny beg. He's damn near ready to rip at his clothes in haste to get them off, the last pieces of restraint forcing him to take his time, but damn, he wants to be inside his lover again.

Jonny hesitantly looks over his shoulder. "That good enough? Sir?"

"It's enough for now," Sean says, running his hand up Jonny's back, slipping it into his hair and tightening it in the strands. "Come the end of the week I might actually make you crawl on glass for me, boy, but for now it's enough." He's on his knees behind his lover, cock pressed up hard against Jonny's arse, and he ought to be thinking about lube now, not about how it'd feel to work his cock in when Jonny's dry, bare, and marked red from the flogger.

_Really? Crawl on glass?_ Jonny's brain misfires a few synapses at the visual. Not that he wouldn't do it. But at the image in his mind of him crawling, through glass, just to get to the pain Sean's offering. He nudges back against his lover's cock, wanting to be taken like that, raw and exposed and aching already. "Please, fuck me."

Sean spits on his palm and slicks saliva down the length of his cock; it's not much, maybe not even better than nothing. But it's what he's giving Jonny. He slides his thumbs into Jonny's cleft, holding him apart, squeezing already-bruised flesh, and presses the head of his cock to Jonny's opening. "Fuck, you're so tight," Sean growls out, behind clenched teeth, and then he starts forcing himself forward, a fraction of an inch at a time.

He shouldn't push back. He knows it. His body's barely opening to Sean's forward movement. So there's no way it's not going to hurt like sin to push back. He's fighting the urge. Tries so damned hard not to push. It lasts a good two minutes, long enough for Sean to inch into Jonny's ass. Then he pushes, in spite of knowing better, ignoring his brain and body, hands pressing into the bed as he arches his back and pushes. Then he's screaming, the endorphins slamming his nervous system, breathing hard, and still pushing.

Sean wraps both hands around Jonny's hips, tugging him back with a sharp move and a forced grunt, _Christ_ , all the way in and it's fucking fantastic. "That's it," he growls, " _scream_ for me, lover," and he pulls back, shouting himself when the stretch burns.

Christ, it hurts. Jonny closes his eyes against the pain, the world white on black, and it doesn't help. Still hurts. But he's not stopping. He knows there's pleasure on the other side. Just have to get to it.

The next slide in's easier, though the drag's still painful for Sean as well as Jonny. And then the next, and the next, and Jonny's opening for him, the body losing its ability to resist, and Sean leans forward, shoving a forearm across Jonny's shoulders and pounding in even harder. "Just like that," he pants, "take it for me, just like that, come on..."

Jonny's taking it, his body relaxing in a sudden rush of adrenaline, opening wide enough to accommodate the thrusts, let the pain wash. He's spread out flat on the bed, Sean's arm holding him down, knees as wide as they can go against the floor. "Yes, sir, please, good."

Sean wraps a hand around Jonny's cock, stroking him off in time with the thrusts of his hips. "Yes, fuck, Christ it's good -- you're so fucking hot, God, taking all this for me, hurting for me, love fucking you -- so much, _God._ "

"Nnngh," Jonny winces at the first touch of fingers on his cock. Sudden, abrupt change. He likes it. "More. Love it. You hurting me. Fucking me like this."

Sean's nails dig into Jonny's shoulder all over again. "Can you come this way?" he asks. "From me hurting you?"

"Think so. Haven't really thought about it." Jonny smiles. "G'head, try."

Tightening his hand on Jonny's cock, Sean sinks his nails into Jonny's shoulder and drags them down, hard and fierce, white lines coming up on his skin.

It takes a minute, two, then the pain triggers the reaction necessary and Jonny's coming, brutal pulse after pulse, over Sean's hand, against the blanket, body shaking almost violently with the need to release everything.

Another few thrusts and Sean's coming with him, leaning forward to bite down hard on Jonny's shoulder as the pleasure takes him. It's so good -- _so_ fucking good he's almost blind with it, moaning into Jonny's skin when it's finally over and he can breathe again.

Jonny collapses onto the bed, letting Sean's weight caress him as he sinks deeper, the bite spiraling him the last steps into oblivion. "Fuckin' Mary and Joseph, that was intense," he mutters into the blanket.

Intense is wrapping his arms around his lover and thinking three words that got him into trouble in Paris. Intense is not being able to breathe, not being able to think, and holding back words only because he doesn't want to let them spill over in the wake of the best sex he's ever had. Intense is nodding against Jonny's back, leaving a light kiss that probably feels like sandpaper with Sean's stubble rubbing across reddened skin.

"Not sure I can move." He's definitely sure it doesn't matter. He doesn't think Sean's going anywhere. Hopes not. Would pray if he remembered how. Jonny doesn't want to lose this, to fuck up, to say the wrong things. "Not in any hurry."

"Maybe as far as the bed," Sean mumbles. "Don't need to go anywhere else."


	5. Never Heard Those Words

Another day turns into another two days, another three, and Sean's just about gotten to the point where he's ready to move his clothes out of his backseat and his trunk. Things are almost normal between them.

Almost.

He wonders how many "normal" people send their lovers off to work with scratches down their chest. How many normal people are waiting by the side of the door at two in the morning, leather gloves on, knife in hand, ready to grab their lovers and propel them into the living room and slam them down over the couch, fuck them bloody and screaming in pain.

Maybe it's not normal, what they're doing. But Sean's not putting the knife down. He's been thinking about this all day long, took a nap while Jonny was at work so he'd be awake enough to do it. Now it's just a matter of getting the drop on him when he comes through the door.

_The long nights are more tolerable this week than last,_ Jonny thinks, walking up the steps to his apartment, because there's someone waiting on the other side of the door. Sean. He's stayed longer than Jonny expected, since the bartender assumed the welder would get bored with him and leave before the week's end. He didn't, and Jonny's starting to wonder if there's something more permanent in the making.

He shakes his head and pushes open the flat's front door, not wishing or hoping for anything other than a warm body to crawl into bed next to.

As soon as Jonny's inside, Sean gets a hand fisted in his collar and shoves him forward. He kicks the door shut behind them.

"Couch," Sean growls, " _now_ ," and there's the knife, bright and sharp in Sean's other hand, sliding down the center of Jonny's chest and holding steady two inches above his navel.

Instinct is fear, and it's right on time, taking over Jonny's body, his heart racing in the seconds before rational thought clicks in and he realizes it's Sean. "Fuck," he spits out, sucking in his stomach as the blade presses down. It's real. "Yes, sir." He moves as Sean's hold allows, heading for the couch, his cock already hard and his brain racing with the endorphins.

Sean trails the blade around to Jonny's back as he bends Jonny over the couch's arm, holds the point above a kidney and uses his free hand to clamp down on Jonny's wrist. "You scream, and you'll end up bleeding. You struggle too hard and you'll end up hurt. You let me have anything I want, and you'll be just fine, and you'll make it through to sunrise. Sound fair?"

Jonny can't think. He knows, rationally, it's Sean and Sean's _not_ going to hurt him. Well, no more than usual. But his brain's not seeing beyond the knife's point, and the instinct's too strong. He struggles instead of capitulating. "What do you want?"

"You. Spread for me. My cock sinking into you until just the thought of being fucked hurts." Sean scores a scratch across Jonny's lower back, bringing a white line up, and he licks his lips at the sight of it.

"Oh, fuck." Jonny hisses. "Not gonna just give it to you." He's betting Sean'll like the fight, so he dares to jerk forward, away from the blade, not wanting to force Sean's hand too soon.

If Sean hadn't wanted the fight, he'd have gone into a knifework scene with negotiation and tied Jonny down first. This is exactly what he wanted, and he shoves up hard against the backs of Jonny's thighs, pushing him into the couch, pinning him down with one hand while he pulls the knife away from Jonny's skin.

"Don't care if you just give it to me," he growls, "I can take it. Just like you want me to. _Slut._ "

"Slut. Oh, yeah, that's what you want. A slut who'll put out for you." Jonny's pinned more securely than he'd expected, wedged tight against the back of the couch. He jabs back with his elbow, a cursory protest. "Take it then. C'mon."

"Slut who'll beg for more. Who can't get enough." Sean grunts with the elbow's impact, cuffs Jonny on the back of the head. "That's you, lover. Begging and crying and still can't get enough of it, can you?"

"I can take whatever you dish out, bastard," Jonny spits out. "Not gonna beg. Not tonight."

"No?" Sean grins, shoves the back of Jonny's shirt all the way up to his shoulders. "Not even if you're bleeding and aching and I still haven't let you come?"

Jonny moans, the visual alone stiffening his cock against his jeans. "Bleed me out. Maybe then, I'll ask nicely."

Sean pins Jonny down at the back of the neck, holds him still with the weight of his body. He starts at the bottom of one shoulderblade, sets the knife's edge down and presses, light, almost so light it's more a whisper than a touch. But there's a thin trail of blood left behind, just enough to gleam red against the blade, and once the cut's drawn shoulderblade to shoulderblade he sets the knife aside, leans down and presses his lips just underneath the line.

"Shit, man, that's ..." Jonny loses the thoughts, senses on overload. Sean's lips, tongue on his body, soaking up _his_ blood. "Oh, fuck, man, don't." It's sliding into a role, something he's not familiar with. "I'll be good for you."

"You're already being good for me," Sean murmurs, flicking his tongue against the edge of the cut. "You're bleeding for me. Such a good boy. Taste wonderful."

"You're going to hurt me, aren't you? Cut me more?" Jonny's brain wars with the answer he wants to hear, part of him craving the pain, a tiny recess knowing it's insane.

"Yes," Sean breathes, flat of his tongue running all the way across the cut, shoulderblade to shoulderblade. A month ago he'd have been told he was a lunatic for wanting this, an abusive bastard for doing it. And now... now, he's not expecting to hear either, and it feels so good he's almost shaking from it.

He is insane for wanting this, wanting to be hurt to the point he can't move, can't think about anything other than the sublime pain. A month ago, before Sean, it was random, fists in alleys and rough fucks. Now it's perfect, nearly all the time, abuse layered and laced with something he won't call love, not yet, but it feels better than he has in a long time.

"Please, sir, don't do this," he mock-protests, every muscle and nerve in his body crying the opposite, wanting to be set on fire.

Sean takes the knife between his teeth and slips his hands under Jonny's stomach, unbuttons and unzips his jeans, slips a hand into his fly. "Want this instead?" he says, sounds muffled by the blade.

"Want it. Yes. That. More." Jonny wants the knife back, too. He wants it all. Has never wanted so much, so intensely. He keeps waiting to wake up, find it's all just a lucid dream. There's no way he can be getting _this_ , being this happy.

Sean's been feeling the same way since moving in here. Waiting for the other shoe to drop, to find out Jonny's ready to see him go. Every day he's here feels like a gift, and he's trying to get as much as he can, _give_ as much as he can, until the day he's asked to leave. Right now that means shoving Jonny's jeans down over his thighs, unzipping his own and tugging his cock out. It means scoring a cut across Jonny's lower back, deeper this time, enough that the blood wells up behind the blade.

"Fuckin' hell, that hurts." Jonny can't keep the words from seeping out, and it's not a complaint, not at all. It's closer to being a strange "thank you" and a couched plea for more. There's something not right about that, Jonny thinks when he has those random, clear-thought moments. He probably shouldn't want the pain _this_ much, enjoy the roughness Sean uses in tugging his jeans down. But he does, and he's determined not to let this one leave, not to fuck this up.

"Supposed to hurt," Sean says, and the voice in the back of his head that used to tell him _hurting others is wrong, and hurting the ones you care for is sick_ is almost gone these days, drowned out by Jonny's cries and the way he clutches at Sean's body when they're turned over that way. The way he clings at night, almost as hard as Sean does. Sean drags the knife up a fraction, scores another line across Jonny's back. "Fucking beautiful."

"I know." Reassurance, to himself, Sean. "Ahh. Feels good. Hurts like a two-for-one happy hour."

Sean laughs, finally puts the knife down. He wraps his hand around his cock, draws leather-cased fingers down his length and watches the contrast of black against skin. "Want to be inside you," he whispers. "Feel you squeezing me 'til I think I'll break." Head of cock lines up against puckered opening, and Sean gives a small thrust forward, just enough to get the head inside. "So good for me. So tight for me. Christ, Jonny."

"C'mon, Sean, fuck me." Jonny shoves back, hard, fast. "Force me open. Tear me apart."

" _Unhh._ " Sean's eyes slam shut, Jonny's eagerness halfway to doing him in. "Fucking slut," he growls, and he jerks forward, pushing Jonny back into the couch's arm. "Want to hurt for me, break for me, bleed for me? Give me _everything_. Fucking scream the walls down."

"Christ, yes. Fuckin' slut." Jonny braces his hands, finding whatever hold he can, and returns every move of Sean's with an equal, opposite force. He's gonna be bleeding, gonna hurt. For days. And, fuck, his throat's gonna be raw from all the screaming.

"Jesus, Jonny." Sean's already panting, smearing blood behind him as he shoves a hand up Jonny's back. He plants his hand on Jonny's shoulder, leaving a red handprint there, holding tight and fucking Jonny as hard as he can, wanting him to tear, bleed, break for him, God, anything Jonny's willing to give, everything Sean can take and it's never going to be enough. _Need you. Oh, fucking God, need you so much._

Jonny can't help but wonder if he'll not be enough, if Sean will want more than he can give, more than he knows how to give. There's a nagging doubt in his brain, that he's too naive, doesn't understand what he's getting into, no matter how badly he wants it, how severe the craving is, the kind that wakes him at night with a twisting yearn in his chest.

"You close?" Sean gasps, pounding into Jonny's body again, again, the feel of Jonny's arse around him so tight it's making Sean's whole body ache. "Want you to come for me. Want to hear you scream with it."

That's all he needs. Jonny comes, screaming till he can't breathe. No words. Just moans, random and nonsensical, screaming till he can't see straight, his vision bloodied and battered.

Sean's following right after him, fingers digging into Jonny's flesh, shoving his cock in so deep it almost hurts. And he's screaming, too, harsh furious groans that leave him hoarse and winded.

When the screaming's done, and Jonny's thankful for being in the apartment over the garage where no one in the house proper is going to give a damn, he collapses, letting his body go limp under Sean's weight. There's not a muscle that doesn't ache, not a joint that hasn't been stretched. And he's not complaining in the least.

It's several minutes before Sean tries to move. Longer before he tries to speak. He wraps Jonny up in his arms, holds him close and kisses his shoulder, tasting copper under his lips.

"Let me get you to bed," he murmurs. "And I should clean you up. Take care of the cuts I made."

"Yeah, bed, cuts." Jonny's drifting on the last surge of endorphins. "Take care of me, Sean. Always."

"Always," Sean murmurs. Not just _as long as you'll have me_ but _always_. He tugs Jonny up, gets him undressed and moves him into bed, not easy when his lover's drifting in his arms. Once he's in bed, though, Sean heads to the bathroom and gets the antibiotic cream, gauze to try to keep the stains off the bedsheets for once.

"Falling for you," he murmurs. "Have been since we met. You figured that out yet?"

"Think I clued in about the third date." Jonny's voice is more distant than it should be, he thinks, especially for a serious conversation. And that's what this is. Isn't it? _The_ conversation, the one about love and forever. "Not love at first sight," he muses, aloud and not meaning to, but knowing it doesn't matter. "Fell hard, though, when it started."

"I love you," Sean murmurs, finishing with Jonny's back and stretching out next to him, curling around his body. "Everything's so good with you. I don't want to lose you. Ever."

_I love you._ Jonny's never heard those words. They're nice. He smiles, nuzzles back against Sean's chest, ignoring the sting of the cuts as he moves. "I love you," he says, hesitant on words he's never spoken. "Stay with me. Forever."

"Yes." Sean kisses Jonny's shoulder, wraps an arm around his waist. "Always."


	6. Can Never Get Enough

It's nervewracking sometimes, trying to spring good news on a lover. Sean's sure Jonny's going to look at him and ask if he's out of his mind. Or he'll want to know why Sean's doing this, or have some question Sean can't answer. _Maybe this was a bad idea. God._  
  
He parks the car and heads upstairs, slipping his key out of his pocket and letting himself in. "Jonny? I'm home."  
  
"Sure thing, Chad. Yeah, I can cover for you." Jonny's on the phone, sitting on the couch, t-shirt and jeans, half-buttoned, no shoes. He waves at Sean, motions him over. "I understand. No, dude, really. Chance of a lifetime. Take it."  
  
Sean drops his keys on the kitchen counter and heads over, sprawling across the couch -- and Jonny -- resting his head in Jonny's lap.  
  
Jonny laughs, tousles Sean's hair, long true blonde strands. "Hi, lover," he says, smiles. "Uh, no, Chad, not you." He rolls his eyes. "I don't call you lover, no matter how good you kiss. Now, it's two shifts first of the week, you owe me a holiday shift later." He pauses, listens. "Sure. Have fun."  
  
"Welcome home," Jonny says, toggling the phone off and dropping it on the couch. "Comfortable?"  
  
"Mm, very," Sean says, grinning up at Jonny. "Trading off with Chad for something?"  
  
"Yeah. He got this incredible flight deal to London and we juggled so he could do it. I'm working his Monday and Tuesday shifts and then he'll give me a holiday shift later." Jonny smooths back Sean's hair. "You need this cut just a bit. Want me to do it later?"  
  
Sean grins; the idea's impossibly cute. "Yeah," he murmurs. He shifts a little, settling in better on Jonny's lap. "I have news."  
  
"What?" Jonny squirms with Sean's movements, the shift rubbing his head against Jonny's crotch, cock responding. "Good news or bad?"  
  
"Good news," Sean says, then bites his lower lip, hoping it goes over well. "I found us a house we can rent."  
  
"A --" Jonny starts, then goes silent. His hand stills in Sean's hair. He's shocked, surprised. _He really means not to leave._ "A house?" He finds his voice again, clearing his throat. "Where?"  
  
"It's further out than here. It'd mean a longer drive to work for both of us, but..." Sean takes in Jonny's expression, _thinks_ it's a good one. "But there's a basement and it's pretty far away from any neighboring houses. Kind of small, but bigger than here. I thought maybe in the next couple of days you could come look at it..."  
  
"We need a basement?" Jonny suspects where Sean's heading with the idea, but he's not wanting to assume. He's tried not to get too far ahead in this relationship, take too much for granted. "Bigger than here. Real walls even, I bet."  
  
"Real walls," Sean says softly, "space to grow into. Between us it'd be something we could afford. Is it something you'd want?"  
  
"Yeah. I think so." Jonny doesn't turn away, makes himself look at Sean while he asks what he needs to make sure of. "You want to stay around that long? You're sure? I don't want you trapping yourself."  
  
"I was ready to ask you the same thing," Sean murmurs, reaching up and brushing his fingers across Jonny's face. "I like what we have. A lot. I don't want to lose it."  
  
Jonny kisses Sean's fingertips. "Don't want to either. House sounds good. I'm sure sis wouldn't mind having me out of here."  
  
"I just like the idea of having more room. And having it with you. And you know... I've not had a place of my own here. Moved in with him, then moved in with you and... I like the idea of having someplace _we_ can call _our_ own." Sean grins, rubs his index finger over Jonny's lips.  
  
"Our place. Yeah." Jonny sucks in the edge of Sean's finger, tugs it between his teeth before letting go. "Fuck me, Sean. Like you wanna break me."  
  
"Yeah," Sean breathes, sitting up and turning, pushing Jonny to his back against the couch cushions. "Want that," he whispers, biting at Jonny's lips, "want _you_ , so much..."  
  
"Ditto. Want all of it. Every inch. Every bruise. Every word of love you whisper when you're beating me till I can't stand up." Jonny scoots himself back, coy grin. "C'mon, take it."  
  
Sean crawls up on top of him, lands between Jonny's legs and wrestles for Jonny's wrists. "Love you when you're hurting for me and fighting me and screaming the walls down with my name," Sean grins. "Love the way your body opens for me like you can never get enough."  
  
"Can't get enough. Ever." Jonny struggles, albeit half-heartedly. "Love it when you take me down. Want more of it. Want you to teach me what I don't know."  
  
"Want room to play as rough as I'd like," Sean says, pinning Jonny's wrists and pressing them to the couch's arm. "Have I ever told you how much I love the way you go to work bruised for me?"  
  
Jonny's squirming again, tugging his wrists up, working for those bruises. "Yeah, Chad's admired your handiwork, says I'm a lucky boy."  
  
Sean grins, ducks his head just a little. "You show off?" he asks softly, glancing back up at Jonny's face and then licking at the side of his neck.  
  
"Not intentional. He nudged me and I winced, that big bruise on my side, the one that's been black for a week, so he asked and I," Jonny stops, takes a breath, "sorry if I did something wrong."  
  
"You're talking too fast," Sean murmurs, still licking in the spaces between words. "And you didn't do anything wrong. I like the idea of people we can trust seeing my marks on you."  
  
"Sorry. Always do that when I'm nervous." Jonny takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly, something that's more difficult than it should be with Sean licking him. "Chad's safe. He's in the scene, and was gushing over the patterns."  
  
Sean's going to start blushing any minute. But at the moment he's more busy turning patches of Jonny's neck and shoulders red than worrying about his own cheeks, and he bites down hard, then harder. "So proud of you," he whispers. "You're so good when you're taking pain for me."  
  
"Oh, fuck." Jonny pants hard at the bite. Damn, it's good. Fuckin' good. Hard. And it'll bruise like a saint. "Love taking it."  
  
 _Fuck me like you want to break me._ Sean lets one of Jonny's hands go and reaches down between them, tugging down Jonny's zipper and sliding his hand inside.  
  
Jonny pulls his hips up, stretches into Sean's grasping. "Oh, yeah, been thinking 'bout that all damned day. Much better than paying bills."  
  
"It's been distracting me all day at the plant, too," Sean says, wrapping his hand around Jonny's cock, squeeze-stroking. "I keep wanting to add things to my spreadsheets like _tortion test, performed on lover_ and _pressure statistics_... speaking of..." The stroke turns into a hard squeeze, and Sean doesn't let up.  
  
There's no word to properly convey the intense pain of that sudden move, so Jonny just screams, letting out a multisyllabic nonword, following it up with a sharp panting, trying to regain a moment of sense before Sean moves to the next step.  
  
Sean lets himself revel in the sounds Jonny's making just for a minute before easing up and dragging his hand back out of Jonny's pants. He jerks his clothing down, around Jonny's thighs, and shoves his shirt upwards on his chest.  
  
Being stripped excites Jonny and he tugs his shirt on up, over his head, letting it dangle and twist in his hands. "Please, Sean, want you inside me, hand on my cock, telling me I can't come till you do."  
  
As the words are spilling out, Sean's shoving his own pants down and looking for the lube, shoving a hand under the couch cushions and groping for it. _There._ Yes. Not too much, though; he slides a palmful of it over his cock and then drops the tube into the cushions again. Jerks Jonny's pants down further, enough to give himself room to fit between his legs. "You don't get to come 'til I tell you," Sean says, and he pushes Jonny's thighs as far apart as he can and then shoves in, awkward at first, angle far from perfect, but _oh_ , God, there, and as soon as he starts sinking in it's so good he can't stand it.  
  
The angle's all wrong, Jonny's back bent against the couch arm and aching as Sean sinks in. "Don't come. Yes, sir." He's ignoring the pain in his body that's not good, focusing on Sean.  
  
Sean can't get himself all the way in this way, can barely rock the head of his cock in, but it doesn't matter. What matters is what Jonny's giving him, his body stretched out under him and willing to take whatever Sean's pressing on him. Sean gets his hand between them, wraps long fingers around Jonny's cock. "You're so good for me," he breathes, jabbing in as deep as he can go. "So -- _fucking_ \-- good for me..."  
  
It hurts, the jabbing, and not in a good way, but Jonny's taking it. Maybe he shouldn't. Maybe, he thinks, he should be thinking it hurts too much. And what's wrong with him for not thinking that way. _So good for me._ Then all he concentrate on is Sean's hand, long fingers easing over swollen flesh.  
  
The angle's just a little too awkward, fingers slipping, body already aching. Sean bends forward, slants his lips over Jonny's, then pulls back, bracing himself on the couch and catching his breath for a second. "Up," he says, "on your knees, bent over, can't get at you the way I'd like." He grins.  
  
"Thanks," Jonny mutters, nearly under his breath, shifting and turning himself. He settles again, after a moment, a few breaths, on his knees, forearms on the couch's edge. It's much better, not that he was was going to complaing about the other.  
  
"There," Sean murmurs, curling up behind Jonny and just pressing the length of his body against Jonny's back, running a hand down Jonny's chest and tangling his fingers in the curls at the base of his cock. "Better?"  
  
"Yeah, better." Jonny moans the last of that, Sean's fingers working a magic he has yet to comprehend. "Fuck me now?"  
  
Sean licks up the side of Jonny's neck and runs his tongue over the curve of Jonny's ear. "You know, we could do this easy," he murmurs. "Doesn't always have to break us both."  
  
"I know. I like the rough, how you pull me apart before all the pieces come together." Jonny whimpers at the licks. "I'll take the easy, too. Just want you, Sean."  
  
"Just want you," Sean agrees, biting the back of Jonny's neck as he slides into him again, hands tight on Jonny's hips. He's almost curious what _easy_ for them would look like.  
  
"Yeah, that's," Jonny gasps, "perfect." He pushes back, hips angled and arse begging for more, deeper, harder. Easy would be fine, it'd be great, but it's not what Jonny wants at the moment.  
  
Sean might've been happy with easy if it weren't for the way Jonny's body is arching for him, the curve of his spine, the way his arse is just begging to be ridden hard and fucked deep. Sean grabs the hair just at the nape of Jonny's neck and shoves his face into the cushions, and he slams in hard, rough, one deep, brutal shove after another.  
  
That's it. Exactly what Jonny wants, needs, craves more than the nicotine habit he developed in high school. It's brutal, exacting, better than every fuck he's ever had. Easy they'll do later. Sure. At the new house. The thought catches in Jonny's brain. Buying a house together. Okay, big step.  
  
"Fuck, Sean, yes," Jonny mutters into the couch arm when one thrust hits perfectly, his mind snapping back to where it belongs.  
  
Sean wraps his hand around Jonny's cock again, squeezing hard at the base. "Don't come," he whispers. " _Mine_. You come when I tell you."  
  
"Yes, sir," Jonny snaps out, brain brought sharply into tune with body. He wouldn't think of coming, ever if it's what Sean demands.  
  
"Love you," Sean breathes, and then he lets himself get lost. Just lost to the pounding rhythm and the bone-jarring thrusts, body slamming against Jonny's and cock aching from the roughness. It doesn't have to be this way, wouldn't need to be this brutal, but the fact that it _can_ be, that Jonny _wants_ it this way, every bit as much as Sean wants to give it... _God_ , that's amazing, and Sean doesn't think he'll ever take it for granted.  
  
Love's not supposed to hurt, if Jonny believes what he's been spoon-fed all his life. It's also not supposed to involve letting guys shove their cock up your ass. Or so his so-called loved ones tell him. "Love you," Jonny whispers. Love _is_ supposed to wrack your soul and sear your heart. And, in Jonny's case, shred your body into aching pieces. He shoves back as much as Sean's hold will allow, meeting every thrust with force until he feels like he's torn apart, can't take anymore. But he will.  
  
Sean's grip on Jonny's cock must be past painful by now. Sean knows how far Jonny's going for him, how far he's willing to go, and there's no words for how grateful he is for it. He slides his hand down Jonny's cock, starts stroking hard and fast. "All right," Sean breathes. "When I come, you can follow me over."  
  
 _Thank you. Oh, fuck, thank you._ Jonny's cock is way past hurting, and the strokes are almost painful, but, god, they're good, so fuckin' good, and he can will himself to hold back just long enough. "Yes, sir," he pants, "when you come. Thank you, sir."  
  
Sean holds back as long as he can, just to give that added bit of torture -- _you can come any minute now, just not yet... not yet..._ \-- but he can't last too much longer, and he comes screaming, arm wrapping around Jonny's waist and tugging him back hard.  
  
The force of Sean's orgasm slams into Jonny's body, and he's coming just as hard, with screams to match. It's never felt so good, he thinks, every single time he comes for this man. He's spilling out over Sean's hand, the couch arm, not giving a damn about either getting sticky.  
  
Hot, wet, and sticky all over. Sean collapses against Jonny's back and holds him close, leaving warm soft kisses all over his shoulder. "I love you _forever_ ," he whispers, everything about his body language saying he could stay this way indefinitely.  
  
Forever's a long time, Jonny thinks, but he's willing to love Sean that much, for that long, trust that nothing's going to go wrong. "Forever and the night after," he murmurs.


	7. Never Had A Dungeon Before

Sean doesn't know why he's nervous. It's not as though he thinks Jonny's going to say no outright. He might not like the house, but all that means is they have to keep looking, and they have to find another landlord who won't ask too many questions. And it might be perfect after all.  
  
But he's nervous all the same, palms sweaty as he pulls into the driveway. "Here it is," he says. "It's bigger than it looks." It looks like an ordinary single-floor house, but it's got a full basement, two bedrooms, a bathroom upstairs and one downstairs. It's sixty years old or so, brick, and there's ivy covering one side of it. No garage, but it's got a long driveway and enough room for two cars in it.  
  
It's a big step, moving out of the apartment and in with Sean. In. With. Sean. Jonny says it to himself a few times as the car comes to a stop. "It looks nice." He's nervous. "Can we afford it? I mean, this is a good neighborhood."  
  
"I can afford most of it, so between the two of us, yeah. It'll be tight the first few months, but I have enough saved up for the deposit, first month, last month." Sean cuts the engine and reaches over. "Come inside? Take a look." He squeezes Jonny's hand.  
  
 _So I'd just be a kept boy. That's not bad, I guess._ "Sure." Jonny smiles. "I'll look around. Let go of my hand and I'll get out of the car."  
  
"Yeah." Sean grins. "Yeah, let's go in." He lets go and gets out of the car, walking up to the door as he digs the key out of his pocket. _This could be your new place._ It's half the size of -- his last lover's house, but it's bigger than the apartment, and it's more than good enough. More than he expected, and a place he can come home to, a place it'll be safe to have a lover he'd just as soon hear screaming as laughing or coming.  
  
Jonny walks in, looking around the living room. It's nearly as big as his apartment. "It's not too far from the club," he says, moving to the room's far end. _Wow. Fireplace. Cool._ "Close enough to your office to work?"  
  
"Close enough." Sean shoves his hands into his back pockets. "Near enough to the highway it won't be a bad drive. The neighbors are quiet, don't ask questions. The landlord liked me, I think. And the space is good. You want to see the bedrooms first, or the basement?"  
  
"There's a basement?" Jonny turns. He's blushing slightly. "And we only need one bedroom. Don't we?"  
  
"Yeah." Sean catches Jonny's wrists in his hands and starts backing him up, slowly, into the door. "But we can use the other for a study or a guest room or sommat. Whatever we need." Sean's thigh goes between Jonny's legs and presses in hard. "Just need you."  
  
 _Just need you._ Wonderful sentiment. "Need you." Jonny spreads his legs, pushes back against the door for support. Involuntary motion, hands go flat against the wood, wrist held firmly. "And the basement? What we putting down there?"  
  
"A hook in the ceiling. More in the walls. Maybe doublecheck the soundproofing before we get started." Sean pulls Jonny's wrists up, pins them next to his head. "Whips, chains, things that hurt. If it's what you want."  
  
Jonny's jeans are tight, cock twitching in response to Sean's description. "Whips and chains sound wonderful. Maybe paint it black, industrial chrome fixtures."  
  
"Never had a dungeon before," Sean says, grinning. He licks up the center of Jonny's throat. "Never thought I was going to need one." He digs his teeth in just enough to be felt, there at the base of Jonny's throat. "You like it?" he asks.  
  
"Fuck." Jonny slams his head back into the door, closes his eyes. "Hurts, but yeah, I like it. Dungeon, too. Lots of things that hurt. You."  
  
"The house," Sean says, pressing his thigh in harder. "You like the house?" He's confident enough about the rest. The house is the only thing he's wondering about now.  
  
"Oh, the house. Yeah. Like what I've seen." Jonny shakes his head. It still amazes him how he loses it around Sean, just melts. "Wanna show me the rest?"  
  
"Yeah." Sean squeezes Jonny's wrists one last time and pulls back. "Come on. I'll show you the rooms."  
  
He pulls Jonny through the kitchen. It's small, but the appliances are new, give or take a couple years. There's enough room for a small table on one end of the kitchen, and then there's the hallway to the bedrooms and the upstairs bathroom. The larger of the bedrooms is in the back of the house, windows facing out onto the back lawn, and the closet's walk-in, big enough to fuck in if one were so inclined. Another space to christen. The other bedroom's more or less average, a good enough space for a study or a guest room, and then there's the bathroom, plain fixtures, tub with a curtain.  
  
Downstairs is a more-or-less finished basement, plain walls made of concrete, and Sean runs his hand over one of them, tapping at it. "Strong enough, I think," he says. "It's not huge, but it's something that could be ours." He raises both eyebrows and looks at Jonny. "If we want it."  
  
"I want it." Three words. Such simple sentences are potent. He wants the house. The bedroom with the window. And, fuck, he can think about being pressed against that glass, cock hard from hours of not being allowed to come, body bruised, being fucked as the sun rises. And the basement. Damn, yes, the basement, where chains could fall from the ceiling and Jonny could hurt for days. "Yes, sir, want it. Now?"  
  
"Now?" Sean echoes, and then grins over his shoulder at Jonny. "You want to christen it early, before we've got our name on the lease?"  
  
"Huh?" Jonny spins around. "Did I ask for that?" He grins. "Yeah, guess I did." He stretches, the move pulling the tails of the button-up shirt over his jeans waistband, exposing just that hint of flesh. "Maybe a little now. Just to make sure we'd be comfortable."  
  
"Drop." Sean tucks his fingers into Jonny's waistband and drags him forward. "Knees. _Now._ "  
  
It's not conditioned, not quite, but Jonny sinks to his knees in front of Sean. He likes this. A lot.  
  
Sean runs his fingers down Jonny's cheek and then unbuckles his belt, unzips his jeans. "All ours," he says. "It's just ours." He gets his cock out, rubs the head over Jonny's lips. "Suck me."  
  
No more talking. Jonny's mouth is otherwise occupied. He leans forward, sticks his tongue out against the tip, opens and sucks in the cock, taking it all the way in, consciously widening his throat's passage before closing his lips around the flesh and sucking. Hard. Moving his head back and forth. He's getting to know exactly what Sean likes, that little flick of tongue, the graze of teeth.  
  
Sean gets his fingers into Jonny's hair and tugs him forward, pushing in as Jonny opens up for him. _Ours._ And then, lower, growled out through nearly-clenched teeth, " _mine_." And he starts fucking Jonny's mouth hard, wanting the feel of Jonny's throat clenching around his cock.  
  
Jonny clenches his hands against Sean's hips, fingers finding flesh and digging in, holding on. _His. Yes._ He holds steady then, letting Sean fuck him, drive his cock deeper, bruise and rub raw Jonny's throat. _Perfect. Great. Just what I want._  
  
It's perfect. It's fucking beautiful. And Jonny can spare his breath for a few seconds while Sean slams in deep and closes his eyes to focus on the sensation. _Fuck_ , that's brilliant.  
  
Another thing Jonny's learning. How to breathe through his nose, not count on getting air into his lungs any other way. He clutches, holds tighter, ignoring for the moment his cock straining against denim, focusin solely on the cock shoved down his throat.  
  
Sean knows this isn't the safest way to play. He knows it's not sane, that there's a limited amount of time he can take Jonny's air and know for certain he can bring him back up. But he pushes that time as far as he can, gets it right to the edge and holds on before pulling back.  
  
Some day it might be too much, too far, but not today. Today it's just right, perfect, and Jonny has just the edge of a lightheaded buzz going when Sean pulls back. He just sucks more greedily.  
  
"That's my boy," Sean whispers, tugging Jonny forward again. "Come on. Need you. Want you. Come on."  
  
 _Want you. Need you. Yeah._ Sean's words collide in Jonny's brain. He's still getting used to having someone who really wants him, needs him, isn't just making time and room for him. He pushes his tongue up against Sean's cock as he moves forward, then lets his teeth touch down again, as far back as he can manage. _His_ boy, Jonny thinks.  
  
 _Oh God, fuck, so good._ Sean tightens his grip in Jonny's hair and gives him one more thrust, which is all he can manage before he comes, hard and hot down Jonny's throat. " _Yes._ "  
  
Jonny manages not to choke, a feat in itself, Sean's cock deep enough the come fills his throat. He swallows, conscious decision forced muscles to work, and keeps sucking until Sean's pushing him back. "Thanks," he murmurs, mouth free again but voice raw. "I think I like the place."  
  
"I like it, too." Sean drops to his knees and catches Jonny behind the neck, pulling him close. He slips his hand down Jonny's chest, between his legs, and squeezes hard. "Want to come?"  
  
"Yes, sir. Please?" Jonny leans back, puts his head on Sean's shoulder, turns enough to kiss the edge of Sean's jaw. "You make me like this. So hard."  
  
"You're so fucking good like this," Sean growls, getting Jonny's fly unzipped and sliding his hand in. He wraps his fingers around Jonny's cock, strokes hard and fast and kisses down Jonny's jawline until he can get his lips on Jonny's and kiss him, lick the last traces of his come out of Jonny's mouth. _Fuck, I love you._  
  
"Oh, yeah. Gonna. Can't last." Jonny feels like a 15-year-old again, unable to even think about controlling his cock, much less wanting to. Sean's stroking too fast. Sean's mouth is on Jonny's. The dual assault just slams him, and in another minute, he's coming, body shaking against Sean's hold.  
  
"You are..." Sean licks across Jonny's lower lip as he wraps an arm around his shoulders and hugs hard. "Christ, you are the hottest fucking thing..." He grins and gets his hand out from Jonny's pants, licking up trails of Jonny's come. "Want this. So much. You, me, here."  
  
Jonny's all smiles, near giggles from breathlessness. "When do we move in?"  
  
"As soon as you want. Next week?" Sean asks. "Do you own any of your furniture or are we going to have to improvise for a while?"  
  
"We don't have to improvise. I can get furniture." Jonny figures he can beg his stepmom for the money. He's not on her shit list like he is on his dad's. And she'll even be happy he's getting out of his sister's house, some place where he can be on his own.  
  
"I've got next to nothing," Sean says softly. "But anything I've got--" _hell, anything I am_ \-- "it's yours."  
  
"That's cool." Jonny doesn't say anything about the way Sean's voice drops, tries not to read anything into it. "You pay the deposit, I'll get the furniture."  
  
"Perfect." Sean grins, the serious look easing off. "Next week. It's all ours."


End file.
